Conservatives and Gay Marriage in America

The newsletter that Answers in Genesis sent me today didn't have much content in it, but it linked me back to their site for chapter 15 of The New Answers Book 2, entitled How Should a Christian Respond to "Gay Marriage"? (Yes, they did put gay marriage in quotes.) It's somewhat lengthy, so I won't attempt to respond to every claim they make but instead generally to each topic they bring up. This is probably the longest post I've done yet, so don't feel like you have to read all of it. I've underlined the headings they used in their chapter so you can skip around to the more interesting bits if you like. And if you agree or disagree with what I've said, please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

An Atheist on a Talk Show

 Ken Ham recalls having a conversation with an atheist on some kind of talk show, which I'm sure he didn't make up.

Caller: “I’m an atheist, and I want to tell you Christians that if you believe Cain married his sister, then that’s immoral.”

AiG: “If you’re an atheist, then that means you don’t believe in any personal God, right?”

Caller: “Correct!”

AiG: “Then if you don’t believe in God, you don’t believe there’s such a thing as an absolute authority. Therefore, you believe everyone has a right to their own opinions—to make their own rules about life if they can get away with it, correct?”

Caller: “Yes, you’re right.”

AiG: “Then, sir, you can’t call me immoral; after all, you’re an atheist, who doesn’t believe in any absolute authority.”

I would first point out that there's nothing innately immoral about marrying your sister from an atheist perspective, it's just a culture taboo. Not that it wouldn't be weird or creepy, but it would be difficult for me to argue that it's wrong to do so. However, according to the biblical commandments, incest is a sin and that's exactly what was required for Adam and Eve's children (if they were literal people) to do if they were to populate the earth. Instead of dealing with this issue, Ken turns the tables on the atheist and accuses him of not having any morals. A while back, I covered the issue of the divine command theory (otherwise known as "God commanded it, it's moral") and why it is irrelevant to morals. I would disagree with the atheist's last statement here, however, as while people can have their own opinions, it isn't about what they can get away with. It's about what is and isn't good for society and other people. Morals can, unfortunately, be a complicated issue and no one book (including the bible) has the answers to all tough questions. I know of places where the bible has good advice and I know where it contains bad advice. I think most Christians know how to weed out the good from the bad, highlighting their own sense of non-biblical morality.

AiG: “Do you believe all humans evolved from apelike ancestors?”

Caller: “Yes, I certainly believe evolution is fact.”

AiG: “Then, sir, from your perspective on life, if man is just some sort of animal who evolved, and if there’s no absolute authority, then marriage is whatever you want to define it to be—if you can get away with it in the culture you live in.

“It could be two men, two women or one man and ten women; in fact, it doesn’t even have to be a man with another human—it could be a man with an animal.

“I’m sorry, sir, that you think Christians have a problem. I think it’s you who has the problem. Without an absolute authority, marriage, or any other aspect of how to live in society, is determined on the basis of opinion and ultimately could be anything one decides—if the culture as a whole will allow you to get away with this. You have the problem, not me.”

Um, no. First, our origins have nothing to do with our morals. What isn't important is how we got here. What is important is how we treat each other now that we're here. Incidentally, most animals do operate under some sense of morals despite the fact that they too are, well... animals and don't have brains as developed as ours. They don't have the bible or any other book to tell them what's right and wrong, yet some animals have an especially strong sense of community. And about bestiality, I'm not sure where Ken Ham is pulling this logic from. You can't jump from two consenting adults to an adult and an animal who couldn't consent or even attempt to understand what that means. Now of course Ken doesn't let the atheist respond, or at least doesn't quote him here. I wouldn't let anyone get away with saying something like that without attempting a rebuttal, even if what was said was so stupid it almost refutes itself.


The “Pragmatics” Aspect of Opposing Gay Marriage—Some Cautions

Even though such problems as the spread of HIV might be shown to be a sound argument in this issue, ultimately it’s not a good basis for stating that one man for one woman must be the rule. It may be a sound argument based on the pragmatics of wanting to maintain a healthy physical body, but why should one or more human beings have the right to dictate to others what they can or can’t do in sexual relationships? After all, another person might decide that the relationship between one man and woman in marriage might cause psychological problems and use that as the basis for the argument.

Well, now we're getting somewhere. Yes, it is about giving two consenting adults the right to marry who they want, even if there are consequences (limited to the two in the act) because giving them the right wouldn't infringe on anyone else's rights to choose as well. The answer is staring you right in the face, but I don't think you quite see it. In fact, I'm quite sure, since you continue on for another 3/4 of a chapter.

Allowing the Killing of a Newborn?

Ultimately, it comes down to this: How does a culture determine what is right and what is wrong? If the majority agrees on a set of standards, what happens when that majority is replaced by a different majority?

We attempt to determine what is right and wrong by coming together and reasoning it out. I realize that logic seems to evade those hard-line creationists, so I understand why this concept is so difficult to grasp. But let's look at America today. Take socialized healthcare. Some people believe that it's the "right" thing to do, others believe it's the "wrong" thing. Could it be a moral question? Is is right to withhold care from those who can't afford it? Is it right to charge disinterested third parties to care for another? These are morals questions and there are people on both sides of the issue who think they take the moral high ground. Incidentally, both sides have tried to claim that theirs is the position supported by the bible, though there's no clear command from Jesus pertaining to the government's role in it.

If a different majority comes in and replaces the standards/law, then that's the new law. If you don't like it, then try to change it. You'll have to convince people that you're correct and your reasoning is better than the current reasoning. That's why a democracy is a good thing. Instead of having one man decide the laws (no matter how good a person he may be), we can have the votes of many and attempt to determine where most people stand. I know the objection here is "but what if everyone is wrong?" Tough. If you think we have the wrong standard, don't follow the standard. To date, I've never seen any example of the horrible things that could happen if we all were somehow creating our own standards (which we have been for millenia).

Some might say that there is no way Western culture would allow pedophilia. Fifty years ago, however, most people probably would not have dreamed that America or Britain would ever allow gay marriage. Where does one draw the line? And who determines who draws that line? What’s the answer?

Just as with bestiality, it comes down to consent. Now as I understand, Mary (wife of Joseph) was, according to what I learned in church, a young woman, perhaps even girl, at the age of about 12 when she was betrothed and the angel visited her. Obviously, the church can't consider this to be pedophilia since that would bring charges to Joseph and God that most people wouldn't want to deal with. The question then is, at what age is a person old an mentally ready enough to consent to a relationship? Certainly not at 5. Perhaps at 12. It's kind of fuzzy, really, because peoples' maturity can vary so widely. I think that's partly why we have it at 18 in most place in America. It's a nice safe age where no one can accuse you of being too young.

Does the Church Have the Answer?

One Christian leader was interviewed on MSNBC-TV and was asked about the gay marriage issue. The interview went something like this:

TV host: “Did Jesus deal directly with the gay marriage issue?”

Christian leader: “No, but then Jesus didn’t deal directly with the abortion issue or many other issues. . . .”

This is such a disappointing response. A proper response could have been such a powerful witness—not only to the interviewer but to the potential millions of viewers watching the news program, so people could understand why this Christian leader opposed gay marriage.

Perhaps a disappointing response for you, but an honest answer nonetheless. I think later you'll attempt to twist the meaning of a Jesus-quote to support your views but we'll get there eventually.

The same Christian leader appeared on CNN-TV doing an interview that, in part, went something like the following:

Interviewer: “Why are you against gay marriage?”

Christian leader: “Because down through the ages, culture after culture has taught that marriage is between a man and a woman.”

We believe this kind of answer actually opens the door to gay marriage! How? Because it basically says that marriage is determined by law or opinion.

Really? Because this seems to be the most oft-cited defense of traditional marriage. By throwing this out, what argument do you have left? ...Oh right, the Bible. *Sigh*

So, why is it that we don’t see many Christian leaders giving the right sorts of answers? I think it’s because the majority of them have compromised with the idea of millions of years of history, as well as evolutionary beliefs in astronomy, geology, and so on. As a result, the Bible’s authority has been undermined, and it’s no longer understood to be the absolute authority.

Wow, I've seen creationists confuse the ideas of evolution, cosmology, and abiogenesis, but this is something new. Apparently the people at AiG confuse evolutionary biology, astronomy, and geology with marriage. And willfully and honestly, at that. Wow. Now certainly, science conflicts with the most literal reading of Genesis, but most Christians aren't as conservative as you and don't take the biblical account to be anything other than metaphorical or allegorical.

Gay Marriage—Is Evolution the Cause?

To respond to this heading, don't be stupid. But I think Ken would like to clarify:

It is accurate to say that the increasing acceptance of homosexual behavior and gay marriage has gone hand in hand with the popularity and acceptance of millions of years and evolutionary ideas. But this does not mean that every person who believes in millions of years/evolution accepts gay marriage or condones homosexual behavior.

Ok, well "hand-in-hand" is open to interpretation, I suppose, but nonetheless, they're two completely separate topics that do not overlap. And that's why your last sentence is correct. Another correct sentence is "Not every person who enjoys Kit Kat bars thinks that we need to spend money on NASA's space exploration program." Their claim is bordering on a non sequitur.

Cultures in the West were once pervaded by a primarily Christian worldview because the majority of people at least respected the Bible as the authority on morality. It needs to be clearly understood that over the past 200 years the Bible’s authority has been increasingly undermined, as much of the Church has compromised with the idea of millions of years (this began before Darwin) and has thus begun reinterpreting Genesis. When those outside the Church saw Church leaders rejecting Genesis as literal history, one can understand why they would have quickly lost respect for all of the Bible. If the Church doesn’t even believe this Book to be true, then why should the world build its morality on a fallible work that modern science supposedly has shown to be inaccurate in its science and history?

Maybe the problem for people rejecting the Bible as an authority on morality was when we abolished slavery in America. Another problem could have been our progress toward giving women equal rights. Both go against what the Bible preaches (and we're better off for it) so I suppose I understand what Ken's saying. As a side note, from what I understand, AiG's position on a literal Adam & Eve is a relatively new movement in Christianity. Many of the old saints did not believe in such a literal reading of scripture. And now for possibly the dumbest image AiG has ever produced:

Yes, that's right, churches accepting evolution and millions of years result in abortions, euthanasia, porn, racism, and gay sex. Only one picture can describe my reaction to this stunning display of stupidity.

Mocking the Bible

The author then, mockingly, wrote, “Ah, Genesis. Heaven and earth created in six days, a serpent that talks, and a 600-year-old man building an ark. Just the guide we need to set rational policy.”

 Actually, I think that sums it up perfectly. Props to AiG for doing my work for me!

Were Homosexuals Created That Way?

Human sexuality is very complex, and the arguments will long rage as to the causes of homosexual behavior. In this fallen world, most behaviors are a complex mix of one’s personal choices superimposed on a platform of predisposition. This can come both from one’s genetic makeup and one’s environment (for example, one’s upbringing). Few students of human nature would doubt the proposition that some personalities are much more predisposed to alcoholism and/or wife beating, for instance. But would anyone argue that this would make wife beating acceptable?

No, they wouldn't. And shouldn't. But boy, aren't you having a tough time with the concept of "consent" today, Ken? Wife-beating victimizes one party, leaving her with physical and emotional scars. Gay marriage is the agreement between two people that they both actively wish to participate in the act. Totally. Different.

The case for a “homosexual gene” has evaporated, but let’s say that researchers really were able to identify such a gene. After all, mutations in a cursed, fallen world can cause all sorts of abnormalities and malfunctions. For one thing, that would be a result of the Curse, not creation. And would knowledge of such a gene make right what Scripture clearly says is wrong? Absolute right and wrong exist independent of any secondary causative agencies.

And yet in the previous quote you admit that a person's "genetic makeup" helps determine the sexual identity of a person. However, if you don't agree that genetics (or at least biology) affects sexuality, you might do some reading on the subject. If you don't like Wikipedia, feel free to peruse the 86+ references they cite.

In fact, it is quite possible that a contributing factor to at least some cases of homosexuality is a dysfunctional upbringing right at the time when the child is gaining crucial environmental input regarding his or her own sexual identity. (Notice the importance the Bible places on bringing up children, the family unit, and so on.) But if anything, this highlights one of the huge risks of “married” gay people bringing up adopted children, namely the vulnerability of the children to confused messages about their own sexual identity. To put it simply, if one’s environment contributes to homosexuality, gay marriage will tend to increase the likelihood of the next generation being gay.

Oh no, Mommy and Daddy are fighting again! Also, I like boys now...

I want to link that facepalm picture again, but I feel it would lose some of its effect on repeated appearances. Anyway, when you talk about "huge risks" for sending "confused messages" to children when they're determining their own sexuality, you assume beforehand that it's a bad thing to be gay. As we know, growing up in a mostly-heterosexual society doesn't make you straight. Why should we conclude that growing up in a society accepting of gays would lead to more gays? It's more complicated than that, and it's not as though we can just plug a child into a formula and determine their sexuality before they do.

Also, I'm confused by this image:

Are we saying that men with little mutated elbow stubs need to find physically scarred women with giant gaps in their sides? That it's possible for two differently-mutated people to come together but they won't be happy? That the man and woman on the left are incompatible because their parts don't match? That two men shouldn't be together if their legs are egregiously different sizes? I feel this needs more explaining...

Gay Marriage — What Is the Answer?

In the Bible in Judges 17:6, we read this statement: “In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes” (NAS95). In other words, when there is no absolute authority to decide right and wrong, everyone has his or her own opinion about what to do.

Ok... so you're saying a King can decide right and wrong? But isn't a king still a person? Why does he have the authority to tell me what is and isn't moral? Why does God have that authority? What if their decision is obviously wrong? What if a king or God told me to murder my firstborn son? Shouldn't I refuse?

So how could the Christian leader whose interviews were quoted earlier in this chapter have responded differently? Well, consider this answer:

First of all, Jesus (who created us and therefore owns us and has the authority to determine right and wrong), as the God-man, did deal directly with the gay marriage issue, in the Bible’s New Testament, in Matthew 19:4–6: “And He answered and said to them, ‘Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning “made them male and female,” and said, “For this cause a man shall leave father and mother and shall cling to his wife, and the two of them shall be one flesh?” So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.’ ”

 Wait, why does creating someone give you the right to dictate morality? Does this mean that, because I created my child, I can tell him in no uncertain terms what right and wrong is? Or does it only count if you create the matter from nothing? I don't recall a matter-creation clause in the Morality Dictation Handbook.

But even if Jesus did have that authority, he doesn't talk about homosexuality in Matthew. His point was not that only man and woman should come together, but rather that they should not be separated. Notice the "therefore" in his conclusion. He could have used the example of two men or two woman and his conclusion could have been the same. No doubt AiG disagrees, but the question asked to him (left out of their quotation) was “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?” Notice the question was already posed concerning a man and a woman to begin with.

Because Genesis is real history (as can be confirmed by observational science, incidentally), Jesus dealt quite directly with the gay marriage issue when he explained the doctrine of marriage.

Um, no. All observational science we know of disagrees with the concept of a 6-year creation 6000 years ago where animals were made fully-formed and the original woman was made from a man's rib. The Answers in Genesis website disagrees, but it is also a haven of ignorance, lies, and pseudoscience. So I don't think they count.

Therefore, in Leviticus 18:22, Jesus deals directly with the homosexual issue, and thus the gay marriage issue.

So does Jesus also deal with clothing and cattle in Leviticus 19:19?

"You shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your cattle breed with a different kind. You shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor shall you wear a garment of cloth made of two kinds of material."

According to Jesus, we can't have homosexual marriage, wear polyester, or allow farmers to grow more than one crop. God sure seems to care a lot about petty details of our lives. Doesn't he have anything better to do, like prevent tsunamis or earthquakes from killing innocent people?

Even in a secular context, the only answer a Christian should offer is this:

The Bible is the Word of our Creator, and Genesis is literal history. Its science and history can be trusted. Therefore, we have an absolute authority that determines marriage.

God made the first man and woman—the first marriage. Thus, marriage can only be a man and a woman because we are accountable to the One who made marriage in the first place.

And don’t forget—according to Scripture, one of the primary reasons for marriage is to produce godly offspring. Adam and Eve were told to be fruitful and multiply, but there’s no way a gay marriage can fulfill this command!

And unfortunately for them, we don't base our laws on any religious texts. And I'm not sure how that logic works up in your first paragraph. If I write an accurate book on science and history, can I be an absolute authority determining marriage as well? And what about artificial insemination? Won't that allow us to fulfill this command while still having gay marriage? And what about adoption? Do conservatives really think these are good objections to gay marriage? It seems like they're grasping at every straw they can find, but it also seems like they realize their only real reason is the Bible. So it all but seems like a lost cause. The only things preventing homosexual marriage are the bigotries and homophobia of the right. I hope we can all grow up a little and accept the fact that we're smart enough to make our own decisions without relying on the advice of mostly ignorant nomads who lived thousands of years ago.

Can creationists be “real” scientists?

I'll let your answer to that question be the same as the answer to this one: "Can flat-earthers be "real" scientists?" AiG never attempts to answer that question in their newsletter, so I'll do that for them. On to their words.

A: Although evolutionists interpret the evidence in light of their belief in evolution, science works perfectly well without any connection to evolution. Think about it this way: is a belief in molecules-to-man evolution necessary to understand how planets orbit the sun, how telescopes operate, or how plants and animals function? Has any biological or medical research benefited from a belief in evolution? Not at all.

Only partially correct. Evolutionists (read: scientists) interpret the evidence in light of the current best theories but have to explain how they do or don't fit in with the theory and why or why not. Science, as a process, would work whether or not evolution by natural selection was a fact or not. Your first two items in that list are indeed mostly irrelevant, but the third is an outright lie. Our understanding of "molecules-to-man" evolution directly affects what we know about how plants and animals function and you know it. Almost all of our biological and medical research has benefited from understanding evolution.

In fact, the PhD cell biologist (and creationist) Dr. David Menton has stated, “The fact is that though widely believed, evolution contributes nothing to our understanding of empirical science and thus plays no essential role in biomedical research or education.”

Dr. Menton, you must be either incredibly inadequately educated or an outright liar. Perhaps, in light of your ignorant or deceitful quote, you would be well-advised to do some reading or just a little thinking. If you like to have things narrated to you while looking at pretty pictures in hi-res, you might enjoy C0nc0rdance's 3-part series, The light of evolution: What would be lost. He breaks things up into 8 parts:

1. Pathogen evolution and the Red Queen
2. Human genetic disease, SNPs, and forensics
3. Conservation genetics
4. Agriculture
5. Cladistics and reconstructive phylogenies
6. Discovering genes and regulatory regions
7. Understanding the past
8. Beyond biology

If you don't want to spend 30 minutes educating yourself on the topic (thought it would be time well-spent), I'll just say that understanding evolution allows us to understand how things change. How we change. It allows us to make better medicine because we understand how bacteria and viruses can evolve. You may look at these and say "that's only micro-evolution," but that's not a real objection. The only difference between micro- and macro-evolution is scales of time and biologists don't think within these narrow spaces. There is a real value to having knowledge and even if it were somehow true that it didn't benefit us in any way in the present to understand the effects of science, would that mean we should abandon it for something that helps us understand things even less? (I'm looking at you, Special Creation.)

The rise of technology is not due to a belief in evolution, either. Computers, cellular phones, and DVD players all operate based on the laws of physics, which God created. It is because God created a logical, orderly universe and gave us the ability to reason and to be creative that technology is possible.

The rise of understanding of biological processes and technological mechanisms stem from the same thing - the scientific method. Evolution, like all natural processes, operates on the laws of physics and chemistry, just like cellphones and DVD players. But no one ever said that technology was due to a belief in evolution and it doesn't even make sense that you would assert that. Science seeks to tell us about the world we live in and provide us with solutions to life's problems as well as endow us with all kinds of things that many people would deem luxuries. You readily accept the luxuries it gives while criticizing it for things you apparently don't understand. The alternative would be that you, Answers in Genesis, are willfully lying to the scientific illiterate who will buy your propaganda hook, line, and sinker. And that's just despicable.

Creationism vs. Evolution (feat. AronRa)

Normally I find creation/evolution debates a waste of time and effort, but in particular, one YouTube user AronRa has always been very interesting to follow. Having watched his highly provoking 15 Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism, I thought it would be very interesting to see someone try to take him on in an argument. He just recently finished an ongoing debate at the League of Reason Forums which I will link here. (You can start at the beginning of the thread if you really want to, but this position is where he links to in his profile page so I'll do the same as well.)

If you have the time to read it, I think you'll enjoy it. If you disagree you'll be challenged and if you do agree, I'm sure you'll get some kind of chuckle out of it.

Is there intelligent life in outer space?

This post brought to you by the great minds at the Answers in Genesis newsletter team. Also by the letter C, the number 6, and the word "ego."

A: A number of leading evolutionists, like the late Dr. Carl Sagan, have popularized the idea that there must be intelligent life in outer space. From an evolutionary perspective, it would make sense to suggest such a possibility. People who believe this possibility contend that, if life evolved on earth by natural processes, intelligent life must exist somewhere else in the far reaches of space, given the size of the universe and the millions of possible planets.

I've probably already said this, but the term "evolutionist" is about as helpful when describing scientists as "atomist" or "gravitist." Yes, scientists accept evolution because it's an amazing theory, not because they were choosing them out of a hat and happened to pick cell theory, germ theory, and... uh... creationism. Carl Sagan was an astronomer and cosmologist, so it's strange to assign this term to someone in his field (as opposed to biololgy), but I think you're just trying to single him out as "not one of us." It would, however, make sense to postulate the high probability of life existing somewhere else in the universe because of the massive amounts of planets, each with differing heat cycles, atmospheres, dominant elements, and so on. No one is saying that there is definitely, for sure life out there. But it's hard to say there definitely isn't either.

One can postulate endlessly about possibilities of intelligent life in outer space, but I believe a Christian worldview, built on the Bible, rejects such a possibility. Here is why.

Ah, forget science, the search for life, or any possible concrete confirmations we might have in the future. You've got the answer because your books tells you so... or at least you interpret it to tell you so.

During the six days of creation in Genesis 1, we learn that God created the earth first. On day four He made the sun and the moon for the earth, and then “He made the stars also” (Genesis 1:16).
From these passages of Scripture it would seem that the earth is very special—it is center stage. Everything else was made for purposes relating to the earth. For instance, the sun, moon, and stars were made “for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years” (Genesis 1:14).

...And that's how you end it. Well, you seem to have let your logic go unsaid and assume that we will just "get" what you're trying to say. And what I think that is would be "everything in this universe revolves around the earth" (metaphorically... or a few hundred years ago, literally - thanks Galileo!). We as humans are just so important that everything in the universe was made for us and our enjoyment. All of those beautiful galaxies billions of light years away and the billions more that we'll never see, yes, all for our ocular enjoyment. Forget the fact that they are all pretty much meaningless if we are only here because Yahweh wanted to make us, they are for US! US ONLY!

...'MERICA!


As the creationists would have you believe, because we are so important, there is no need for any other planet to be inhabited by aliens because frankly, God wouldn't care about them. He'd be so concerned with us, meeting our needs, answering our prayers, and sacrificing humans for us that he'd probably just forget about the Klingons. And because of original sin, they'd be sentenced to eternal torture as soon as they're born and they'd have no Klingon-Jesus to save them. So obviously, the best solution would be to just leave the planets dry and lifeless. It's a stretch to believe, but they can do it. I mean, they are creationists.

In case that last statement was too controversial, I'd like to slightly clarify. There are two types of creationists. Those that don't really know much about science but believe in creationism because their pastors tell them they have to and those that do know about science but continue to lie through their teeth and distort facts because this is what they want to believe. And a large majority probably fall into the first category, so it's hard to blame them. I just hope that one day our educational institutions will be able to adequately cover scientific explanations for basic principles, such as evolution. If we had that, I think we could cut TalkOrigins' Index to Creationist Claims in half.

Does the big bang fit with the Bible?

So AiG finally came out with a newsletter I felt like responding to. Personally, I don't care if a scientific theory does or doesn't fit with the Bible because I'm not a Bible-truther. However, some people (or organizations) feel the need to mock modern science without understanding it while claiming that it is wrong and disagrees with their book, and thus we should believe their magical story of creation.

A: The “big bang” is a story about how the universe came into existence. It proposes that billions of years ago the universe began in a tiny, infinitely hot and dense point called a singularity. This singularity supposedly contained not only all the mass and energy that would become everything we see today, but also “space” itself. According to the story, the singularity rapidly expanded, spreading out the energy and space.

Not quite. The Big Bang Theory (BBT) doesn't describe the origin of the universe but rather the development of the universe over time. It also doesn't say that the universe was ever point-like. Other than that, I think you're pretty much correct.

It is supposed that over vast periods of time, the energy from the big bang cooled down as the universe expanded. Some of it turned into matter—hydrogen and helium gas. These gases collapsed to form stars and galaxies of stars. Some of the stars created the heavier elements in their core and then exploded, distributing these elements into space. Some of the heavier elements allegedly began to stick together and formed the earth and other planets.

Ok, sure. I have some reading to do on the Nebular hypothesis, but I don't see anything immediately wrong with that summary.

This story of origins is entirely fiction. But sadly, many people claim to believe the big-bang model. It is particularly distressing that many professing Christians have been taken in by the big bang, perhaps without realizing its atheistic underpinnings. They have chosen to reinterpret the plain teachings of Scripture in an attempt to make it mesh with secular beliefs about origins.

Dang, and I was taken in by its scientific underpinnings. I'm pretty sure there's nothing about BBT that requires an atheistic universe. Many creationist organization that aren't AiG have come to embrace the scientific explanation of BBT for how our universe developed. What exactly in the bible is so "contrary" to the idea that all matter initially expanded outwardly to create the universe we have today? Is that not how Yahweh chose to "speak" it into existence? If not, how do you know this? Do you not accept BBT just because your pastor or Sunday school teacher says so (neither of which are authorities on the subject)? (To clarify, not all creationists are Christians. However, only the ones I know are. If you're Muslim, I'm still talking to you.)

I personally believe that Christians are hesitant to accept this theory because it removes their god as a necessity from a universe that has constantly needed less and less supernatural explanation as our knowledge has grown. Christians probably believe this is the one area of science that needs a god to explain it, otherwise we perhaps could have come from "nothing", but this, like the rest of creationism, is just wishful thinking. I'll admit that BBT is tough to understand because there's just so much that goes into it - from complex physical formulas to jargon to Einsteinian relativity. But that's an even better reason to not go around claiming that a certain scientific theory is incorrect when you yourself don't understand it. Leave science to the scientists.

Freedom of Speech

I was waiting at the bus stop just yesterday when I saw a guy about my age reading Ray Comfort's edited version of On the Orgin of Species (which I confess I am disappointed that it shows up on Amazon's top 3 search results). At first I thought to myself, "This is a joke, right? Like, they didn't really make a book with that dumb of an intro, did they?" But of course, they did, and he was reading it. I didn't get to say anything to him about it and if I did I would have told him to just tear out the first few pages and use them as kindle.

What seems sad to me is that, after all these years, Creationists still attack Darwin for his views on... well, the origin of the species. They defame his character as though it matters and as though it has anything to do with what science said then or says today. But the worst part is that a lot of people might notice the book, see the attractive colors, recognize the iconic name, open to the first page, and think that Ray Comfort has actually somehow disproved a grounded scientific theory in under 50 pages. I know, you wouldn't think it's likely, but the odds are good that it would happen to at least a few people. Looking at the cover, you couldn't tell that it is supposed to be a "rebuttal" but it instead somewhat deceptively states that it merely contain an "introduction," which contains some of the poorest argumentation and misunderstanding about the theory I've ever seen.

On one hand, I hate it. In a country with freedom of speech, any uneducated man can publish a book that says anything he wants it to without any legal repercussions. It just doesn't seem fair that it should be published and given to unsuspecting college students throughout the nation. But on the other hand, I love the US for the same reason. Instead of censoring people we don't agree with, we fairly give them the right to voice their side while soundly trouncing every argument they put forth and conclusively showing them to be frauds. Sure, some people might get deceived in the process, but when you consider that it could be you getting shut up by the feds, you realize how important it is that everyone be permitted to at least speak their mind.

Furthermore, you now have the opportunity (perhaps even the responsibility) to become knowledgeable on a subject so that you can better yourself and others by dissecting the lies and showing yourself to be an honest, contributing member of society. I can't count the times I've been thankful for the ability to read an article that my family, friends, government, or politicians wouldn't have wanted me reading. I would hope that in a completely open forum where everyone's voice can be heard, the truth would win out every time.

What’s the best “proof” of Creation?

Today's Answers in Genesis newsletter was so short it was almost like a twitter post. Still, I'd like to examine their position and explain why I don't find it satisfactory. (Also, in case it hasn't been clear, the titles of my blog posts are usually the titles of the claims/questions I'm responding to.)

A: Creationists and evolutionists, Christians and non-Christians, all have the same facts. Think about it: we all have the same earth, the same fossil layers, the same animals and plants, the same stars—the facts are all the same.

Well, I won't disagree here. We all have access to the same facts. Facts are the world's data. Theories are demonstrably clear explanations of all relevant facts and laws, such as Cell Theory, Germ Theory, and... oh yeah, Evolutionary Theory.

The difference is in the way we all interpret the facts. And why do we interpret facts differently? Because we start with different presuppositions; these are things that are assumed to be true without being able to prove them. These then become the basis for other conclusions. All reasoning is based on presuppositions (also called axioms). This becomes especially relevant when dealing with past events.

And the major difference is the enormous leap you take with your presuppositions. The presupposition that science makes is the uniformity of nature - that the world works the same today as it did millions of years ago. There is a lot of evidence that even this supposition is a reasonable one. Science takes the facts and provides testable hypotheses that undergo a lot of scrutiny before becoming accepted by the entire community. You might say that the science we do now is based on the science that we already have, so that might be a presupposition. But it isn't, because the science that we already have wasn't presupposed. It went through the the same rigorous process to become accepted.

The good thing about science is that you can overturn it if you have enough evidence. Don't think the earth is a sphere? Show your evidence. (Somebody did and we now know that the earth is an ellipsoid slightly elongated at the equator. Even after that was established, somebody else came along and refined that even further.) If you have good evidence and a good hypothesis and your data can explain both your proposition and the theories that came before it, then your theory will become the new standard.

This is not the case in religion. Religion is static and unchanging. Believers are unwilling to stray from their favorite interpretations of whatever holy book they subscribe to and aren't willing to ever admit they're wrong. It's impossible to argue with a Creationist when they say things like:

By definition, no apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the scriptural record. (source)

This means that no matter what or how much evidence you show them, they will never ever admit to being wrong. I can think of one geologist off the top of my head who admits that all the evidence is against him, yet no matter how much he continues to see, he will always be a Young-Earth Creationist. This is not rational, and yet this is what passes for "strong in the faith" today. Believers, just know that when your favorite apologetic website (like AiG) is fervently arguing that Creation has just as much evidence as Evolution, know that they don't seem so sure because of science. They're only sure because they have to be, or they wouldn't have any faith from their point of view. This has been proven time and again when Creationists try to put forth evidence and the scientific community swiftly and easily shoots it down.

Do everyday believers not think it a weak position to be in when everything we know about the world disagrees with their literal interpretation of a book written by men with practically no understanding of the world around them? I honestly want to ask them what evidence it would take for them to change their position, but I think for some I unfortunately already know the answer...

Proving God Exists: Science

In case any of you are wondering, I haven't abandoned my weekly dissection of Answers in Genesis's weekly newsletter. For the last two weeks they've just been... uninteresting. Which is sort of odd for a creationist organization, but I suppose even they run out of pseudoscience now and again. So today I'll be doing a review of the next sermon on the list of Eric Hovind's underwhelming "proof of the Christian God." You don't have to read the first quote, but I thought it funny.

"All rise," comes the command in the musty and dim courtroom. "This court is now in session, the Honorable Judge Science presiding in the case Skeptic vs. Bible." The visitors in the gallery return to their seats as the case begins with opening arguments from the prosecutor. Skeptic's attorney makes several remarks, pleading to Judge Science to see that the evidence shows clearly that Bible is at fault, and cannot be trusted. The jury is on the edge of their chairs, wondering how the attorney for Bible will fare against such staggering evidence. By the time the verbose attorney for Skeptic takes his seat, things look bad for Bible. According to the case made by the prosecution, Science will no doubt rule against Bible. But then something curious happens. Science stands up and walks over to the seat of Bible. Bible stands up. Science mutters sheepishly, "Forgive me, he keeps calling me 'Judge.' I must have sat in the wrong seat, Judge Bible." A collective gasp is heard around the courtroom. As Judge Bible is seated in His rightful position, He holds up the gavel and asks Science how he pleads, "Are you guilty against this court and my laws, or do you plead innocent?" The room is all ears, as the new defendant rises and smiles. "I plead 'No Contest,' your Honor. I only do as you dictate."

Eric, are you honestly asserting that the Bible is to dictate to us what is and isn't scientifically factual? Are we to believe it when it tells us that the earth is flat, there is a solid dome in the sky, that bats are birds, that a whale is a fish, that a rabbit chews the cud, or that placing sticks in front of cows will make their offspring striped? That isn't a great track record. But even if I agreed that it was, why should I take the word of an ignorant nomad who wrote that God created everything in 6 days? How would he know that? He wasn't there. It sounds to me just like any other story a religion would tell you. The bible isn't a science textbook (and some creationists would even agree with me here), so to take any kind of scientific insight from it at all is putting it in a realm it doesn't belong. But to say that the book somehow overrides what we know about this world is preposterous. I wouldn't care if the Bible or any other holy book tells me that the sun revolves around the earth or that sicknesses are caused by demons - I know better, and I won't be naively fooled by your assertions that you know better than thousands of scientists over hundreds of years.

In the realm of debate among skeptics and Christians, science is often brought up as the standard by which we judge truth. Christians often pander to this, searching for the best scientific evidence possible, making multiple pleas to science in order to gain a favorable footing in this contest. But what Christians need to understand is that this puts science in the judge's chair. If we surrender our Bible to determine what is truth, we will never win. For the Bible tells us "Thy word is truth" (Jn 17:17). We've got it all backwards if we think we can appeal to science to vindicate Scripture. Furthermore, we elevate to an improper position the minds of men if we think we can put God's Word on trial to begin with! God's Word is sovereign, and science pleads "No Contest!" Scientific evidence merely bears witness to the absolute Truth of the Bible. In fact, if we may carry our courtroom analogy one step further, when Judge Bible is enthroned, the roles of defendant and prosecutor switch places. It is the skeptic who is now in the hot seat! God's Word is the standard, the skeptic has fallen short of this standard (Rom. 3:23), and we see from the testimony of scientific evidence nothing but verification of this assertion. We see that the skeptic's worldview is all wrong, and that science has no place in the position as judge.

No, the bible isn't the standard. It hasn't been for some time. If something is true, it can be found to be true without requiring some holy book. If something is true in the natural world, it can be investigated and conclusions can be drawn from our perceptions of whatever it is we're talking about. If we can't investigate it, we can't know that any claim is true, so to take the word of the bible (aka, the word of men), we're just assuming that what they said is true. That's a foolish thing to do when it comes to issues such as science (though in this paragraph you seem to drift away from that and lean more toward spiritual issues). There is absolutely no reason to think that the bible has any kind of monopoly on truth or that it is self-proving, because it isn't. And yet you talk as though it is, something you completely failed to show in your last post (Logic) and again fail to do here.

Now let's look deeper. Let's examine the presuppositions of the skeptic or unbeliever. He attempts to disprove the Bible through many venues, one of which is science. But there is a fundamental problem with this. Science depends on the Uniformity of Nature. If the laws of nature changed randomly, there would be no way to measure or experiment accordingly. If gravity, for example, were different from one day to the next, how could science be possible? The obvious answer is that it couldn't. Yet the scientific laws of nature are uniform and unchanging, because God established them to be so. He created laws and told us that they will not pass away – we can count on them (Gen. 8:22). But the unbeliever refuses to believe in God, though he operates with the same understanding of the uniformity of nature as do believers. But why? This is inconsistent with his professed worldview, which claims that nature and her laws evolved into what they are today through an ever-changing and random process. You see, the unbeliever must borrow from the consistent worldview of the Christian in order to even do science or appeal to scientific evidence. He takes God's existence for granted while he tries to argue against Him! In this way, the skeptical or unbelieving evolutionist professes a worldview that is self-refuting.

Just as in your last post, you assume with no evidence whatsoever that certain things don't make sense if there is no god. Again I must ask, why must there be any god for nature to be uniform? Does there need to be a Flying Spaghetti Monster for pasta to be tasty?  That assertion makes as much sense as yours, and if you don't think so, you might want to reexamine your logic. You can't just say that "X requires a God" and leave it at that. You need to show it through evidence and logic - something you haven't even attempted.

You then go on to say that unbelievers opine that nature and her laws evolved through random processes. This simply is not the case. Nature itself does not evolve and laws are unchanging. Life evolves due to the set laws of nature and is not completely random. I've explained this before and I don't need to do it again. You know as well as I that you're being misleading and spreading disinformation.

Christian, when you are presented with a scientific "evidence" against the God of the Bible, remember two things: First, never put the Bible on trial or place science in the judge's seat.  The Bible is the Final Authority. It is God's Word. When you use evidence, use it to show that science agrees with the Bible. And secondly, use science to show that the unbeliever has no way to account for the uniformity of the laws of science without the Biblical God, who never contradicts Himself, and who created laws to be relied upon. Show the skeptic that if he truly believes in Evolutionism, then there is no way he could measure or test his theory at all. Because without God, there is no way we can know anything. God established the laws of nature, and if this were not true, we could not trust these laws. And if we can't trust the laws, we can't trust any of our science. But thank God we can trust the uniform laws of nature and science, because our great God established them to endure when He created the whole universe in just six days.

I was at first under the impression that you were trying to prove to non-believers that a god exists. However, through your shallow logic and assumption of the infallibility of the bible, I have to assume that you're writing to and for Christians with no intent for your message to reach unbelieving eyes. This "logic" wouldn't even have convinced me when I was a Christian, much less now as an atheist.

You've moved on to asserting that without a god we can't know anything. This makes no sense at all - what we do and don't know are based on observation and testing, not by reading books and asserting them to be true despite all evidence to the contrary. Evolution by common descent can be tested in myriad ways and has been done in uncountable ways. (Just look up Tiktaalik or Human Chromosome II, for starters.)

Occam's razor is a useful tool that I would like to briefly explain here. It says that the explanation that fits the evidence and makes the least assumptions is most likely to be correct. An analogy is: let's say that right now, I hear a noise in my closet. I go investigate and find that a box has fallen onto the floor. I can assume perhaps one of two things. Either it fell on its own or it was knocked over by a cat. I know that the law of gravity pulls things down and that I've stacked many boxes on top of one another, so it is likely that one that was at an angle finally slid off the box below it and hit the floor.

Alternatively, I could simply theorize that a cat was crawling around in my closet and knocked it over. This is akin in science to throwing away modern explanations and just saying "Goddidit." However, like the box analogy, this makes more assumptions and leaves more things unexplained than it solves. Think about the cat: how did it get into my apartment? How did I not hear it crawling around for the last few hours and where did it go? Assuming a cat is responsible raises more questions than it answers, so the better explanation in light of the circumstances is that the box simply fell on its own.

In the same way, is it more likely that the universe's laws are uniform because that's just the way it works, or is it more likely that some all-powerful god created it with a blink of his eye and left us no evidence of his existence otherwise? I'm afraid the answer is the former. You can believe the latter if you wish, but you then must explain how and where God exists, show that he exists, and show that he is the one responsible for taking the action in the first place - none of which you can do. It is for this reason that I can't accept your rationale that you display throughout your post and believe it makes more sense to not unnecessarily throw a god into the mix when things make just as much sense without him.

You argue from the viewpoint that the Bible starts off as infallible and perfect. You can't do that when trying to prove God's existence because you're assuming the conclusion. However, if you didn't have your Bible, you'd be up a creek without a paddle because it's the only tool you have. This is why nobody will be convinced of what you have to say. You must start with common ground and work your way up until you've proven your point without assuming anything your opponent doesn't.

So, to my readers, if you disagree with anything I've said, please leave a comment and explain what you think and why.

Peanut Butter, The Atheist's Nightmare!

Sometimes I prefer unintended comedy over purposeful comedy. It's not that I don't appreciate the work that goes into a good stand-up routine or the cleverly crafted storyline and wordplay that made Arrested Development one of the best sitcoms of all time. It's just that sometimes you see and hear people make claims or do things that seem so stupid, they defy explanation. Sometimes these things are done out of stupidity or ignorance, but they're almost always done with a straight face and a serious attitude and that's what makes the downfall so funny. A great example of this is Peanut Butter, The Atheist's Nightmare, which I will embed below.



In case 2 minutes and 6 seconds is too much time out of your day, I'll quote the relevant portion here.

Life from non life, apart from God's direct intervention, is a fairy tale. ... If the theory of evolution was viable, then I should, occasionally, by subjecting this [the jar of peanut butter] to energy, end up having new life. ... On some occasion, I should find new life inside. And so, when we open the jar of peanut butter, we look in there, there's no new life. You may smile at this, but hopefully you'll never forget it. ... The entire food industry (of the world) depends on the fact that evolution does not happen.

Chuck Missler, you are correct; I will never forget this monumental failure of a rebuttal to a theory you clearly don't understand. Evolution, at its simplest, is the change in gene frequency over time. It has nothing to do with life coming from non life, and even if it did, your shoddy demonstration proved nothing but your ignorance.

Abiogenesis is the field of study that deals with life from non-life, but that isn't what you're attacking. You're attempting to disprove the entire theory of common descent with modifications and natural selection, which is completely irrelevant to the discussion of abiogenesis. Evolution deals with life when it already exists. It doesn't matter how it got here - a god created it, it spontaneously arose, chemical reactions caused it to happen - because the theory of evolution only deals with existing organisms. You are, in effect, setting up an egregious straw man when you show the ant in the peanut butter because that is apparently how you understand evolution. Completely uninformed.

I strongly suggest you do some research on the field, but the basics of abiogenesis are that you have an aqueous solution filled with certain chemicals that react according to the same physics that we have today.  When subjected to energy, compounds do tend to form (a basic tenet of chemistry) and some chemicals are able to replicate. These chemicals are not, however, ants, or even cells. You couldn't really even call them life. But as they continue to duplicate and change ever so slightly, they grow in complexity until eventually, after a very long period of time, you have some very very simple organism that you can classify as life. And it's a judgment call on our part when it can be classified as "life," because after all, we define what that means.

Nonetheless, we wouldn't expect to see these kinds of chemicals necessary for life in abundance inside a packaged food product. We certainly wouldn't expect to see any kind of "new" life inside even if it had just come into being, because it would be too small. It would be on the chemical level. You wouldn't know it was there if you were staring at it.

But again, none of that matters, because it is all utterly irrelevant to the theory of evolution. The evidence for common descent (which you are really arguing against) comes by the truckloads every day and you haven't disproved a whit of it by your disappointment of not seeing an insect on your sandwich. When debating with someone, try to make sure you are using the appropriate counter-arguments to their claims, and more importantly, know first what their claims are. If I told you that Manny Ramirez broke the world record for stolen bases and your reply was, "But he had the most strikeouts of his career this year! He's a terrible player!" That would be nice I'm sure, but completely irrelevant. This kind of reasoning is, in effect, what you have displayed here.

If anyone reading this would like a concise, layman's explanation of abiogenesis with narration and pretty pictures, I recommend The Origin of Life Made Easy - a 6 minute video well worth your time.

Are you just a “monkey’s uncle”?

If I were a monkey's uncle, I would imagine that I would have a brother who gave birth to a monkey. This seems like what a Creationist might think evolution works like, but hopefully AiG has a better grasp on science than that. I was laying in bed last night, all excited for the newsletter they would send me today, and it does not fail to disappoint.

A: Perhaps the most bitter pill to swallow for any Christian who attempts to “make peace” with Darwin is the presumed ape ancestry of man. Even many Christians who uncritically accept evolution as “God’s way of creating” try to somehow elevate the origin of man, or at least his soul, above that of the beasts.

Why do Creationists have an obsession with Charles Darwin? He was indeed a smart man and contributed much to the science of biology, but we have come much farther in the last 150 years than he probably ever even dreamed. I think they like to pick on him because he provides a nice punching bag that can never retaliate (since he's dead). Or maybe he looks just a little bit too much like the image of Yahweh they have in their heads. In any case, it's funny that they accuse some Christians of "uncritically accepting" evolution, because that's EXACTLY how Creationism works. The easiest way to be a Creationist is to ignore all of modern science, claim that radioactive dating doesn't work, quote a few frauds that nobody bought, claim that we don't have any transitional fossils, and quote Genesis like it's the unadulterated literal truth. People like myself who decided that they could think and look at the facts for themselves with an open mind came to realize that by deciding so, it's inevitable that you stop being a Creationist. But this is too much for some people - thinking openly like that could almost be seen as blasphemy by some believers.

God tells us that on the same day He made all animals that walk on the earth (the sixth day), He created man separately in His own image with the intent that man would have dominion over every other living thing on earth (Genesis 1:26–28). From this it is clear that there is no animal that is man’s equal, and certainly none his ancestor.

Did he have dominion over crocodiles, elephants, rhinos, and... oh yeah... dinosaurs? I'm sure he would have liked to have think so. One can only wonder what would have happened the first time Adam tried to steal food right out from under a T-rex's nose. This passage certainly makes more sense when you understand that it was written long after dinosaurs died out and the writers had no idea that they ever existed and assumed that man could just dominate everything. Those pompous goat-herders.

Thus, when God paraded the animals by Adam for him to name, He observed that “for Adam there was not found an help meet for him” (Genesis 2:20). Jesus confirmed this uniqueness of men and women when He declared that marriage is to be between a man and a woman because “from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female” (Mark 10:6). This leaves no room for prehumans or for billions of years of cosmic evolution prior to man’s appearance on the earth. Adam chose the very name “Eve” for his wife because he recognized that she would be “the mother of all living” (Genesis 3:20).

Well, according to Genesis 2:18, in the beginning God just created them male - as it pertains to Adam. Because he (or they in 1:26?) forgot to make a pal for him in the beginning, God conjured up a woman from one of his ribs and a bit of special sauce he had laying around from when he forgot to use all of it on his most absent-minded work, the platypus. It is kind of interesting that God paraded all of the animals to Adam, considering that there are billions of different species (or hundreds/thousands/whatever of however you define "kinds"), many of which wouldn't have been able to come to him. What about polar bears, kangaroos, and koalas? Each of these would have been on different continents, not to mention ALL of marine life. Though I would like to personally thank him for the name of "llama." That's always a fun one to spell, and it even looks like the animal itself. How clever!

The apostle Paul stated clearly that man is not an animal: “All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds” (1 Corinthians 15:39).

This is exactly why people at AiG don't understand science. It's because they give a man who lived in 1st century Rome (supposedly as a pharisee) a soapbox for talking about science and it just doesn't make sense. Do all beasts have the same flesh? Are there only four fleshes? In context, Paul was talking about how flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Which is interesting, because didn't Elijah ascend into heaven in his physical body?

Actually, never mind that question, it's not important. What we godless heathens should realize is that there are really two ways of acquiring knowledge about our universe. One is with sound reason, evidence, testing, and peer review, and the other is with one hand on the bible while the other reaches toward the sky. Or, if our hands aren't in that position, they'll probably be in our ears, chanting bible verses until the evidence goes away. But that's OK, because then you'll know that, once you can forget the science that challenges your worldview, you can go back to believing in Creationism, having thoroughly investigated the evidence while not relying on supernatural presuppositions that only find their basis in one book in all of history. Right?

"Proof" That God Exists

The Proof[sic] that God exists is that without Him you couldn't prove anything.

Thank you, proofthatgodexists.org! And no, I'm not kidding. This is actually the crux of the site.

Before they pop this golden nugget of wisdom up onto your screen, you're led through a series of yes/no answer pages asking you if you believe in logical/scientific/mathematical/moral absolutes. (And if you say you don't care if absolutes exists, it just shows an exit button that links to the Disney website. I feel like I should be insulted.) It's really a waste of time though, as they expect you to answer yes to every one and at the end, they quote the scripture about all men having the knowledge of god. Then, on the very next screen, they display this previously quoted block of text as if it somehow follows. Here, I'll break down each of their sections and explain my answers in detail.

Laws of Logic: These laws exist in that we can conceptualize of them. They don't exist in any tangible way; they merely describe the way our universe works. It follows in this reality that if premise A and premise B are true, then the conclusion will be true as long as it follows both premises. I fail to see how this is in any way directly or tangentially related to any concept of a god.

Laws of Mathematics: These laws also exist only in conceptual form. Mathematicians have defined operators such as +,-,/,×, etc. to have certain meanings on specific sets of numbers. This is a human system, not a divine one, so again, this seems to be unrelated to any diestical proposition.

Laws of Science: These exist, though creationists like Sye TenB (creator of this website) often have misunderstandings about what these are. A scientific law is a statement about a specific phenomenon in nature that is always true under a specific set of conditions, such as Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation. Laws are not a "higher tier" than theories but are rather incorporated into theories as explanations of systems that extend beyond the laws themselves. But I digress - these laws actually exist to the degree that we can confirm them. These laws are necessarily inductive in their nature which means that we could be wrong about any of them (but we're generally pretty confident). I think this website meant to say something along the lines of "there is uniformity of nature," though that wouldn't seem to suit their purposes later. (See their arguments against radioactive dating measures.)

Absolute Moral Laws: This is where it necessarily gets tricky. Not because I don't believe that morality can be absolute or objective, but that, at some level, it is necessarily subjective. I don't want to go into too much detail about it here, but suffice it to say that under any specific definition of morality, we can make absolute and objective claims about actions, pertaining to the definition, that will have positive, negative, or neutral value. None of this requires a deity (and about the rape and child molestation in the Bible, they are commanded and not prohibited, respectively) and as such it is a poor example. Perhaps Sye expects us to naturally assume a god is required to believe in rights and wrongs but I won't grant him that, despite being the kind man that I am.

The Nature of Laws (a): I have confirmed that all of these "laws" exist (with the knowledge that some of these are poorly worded) and declare that they are immaterial.

The Nature of Laws (b): Here's the problem: all of these "laws" are lumped together as one unit and I have to either accept or reject the fact that they are man-made or universal as a group. I'll just say that they are all universal if we consider that under each of their specific definitions, they are either true or false regardless of who interprets whatever falls under their umbrellas.

The Nature of Laws (c): Are these laws changing? Well, theoretically we could redefine mathematics so that 2+2 no longer equals 4, but I don't ever see that happening. Logical absolutes cannot change and the principle of uniformity tells me that scientific laws probably won't change either. Morality, however, is either static or flexible depending on how you see it. It is flexible if you see it as a set of rules, since these rules can change based on culture, religion, and what people enjoy or dislike. It is unchanging if you see it as a means by which to increase well-being and decrease suffering, as any other definition would seem to render any talk of morality meaningless. But I'll just go ahead and answer "unchanging"...

Filler page ("preproof"): To summarize, "If you don't believe, my god's gonna getcha! But it's sooooo obvious, I mean, who could deny it? My god's eternal power (you know what that means) and divine nature (with 'divine' being a well defined and meaningful word) are just radiating from every rock, crocodile, and roadside hooker. If you think he doesn't exist, YOUR STUPID!"

"Proof": "The Proof[sic] that God exists is that without Him you couldn't prove anything."

I fail to see and you've failed to show how any of this requires a god. Because there is uniformity in nature, I must be compelled to concede that a god/creator/something made it? What? I don't think your bold and unfounded assertion makes any sense for even the most abstract concept of god.

If I require a god to believe in absolutes, and god is an absolute, then isn't this just circular reasoning anyway? I don't think the guy who is running this website knows anything about logic, but maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm overlooking something.

To be clear, there are two different concepts at play here: reality (ie. the universe and the way it works) and our descriptions and models of how it works, some of which we call laws. And this website is apparently claiming that I require a god to make a conceptual model of this universe based on deductive and inductive principles. Sorry but, to be blunt, you've spent far too much time on what appears to be just another creationist non-sequitur.

Can we "stand on the promises" logically?‏

This week, Answers in Genesis released a slightly shorter but oh-so-sweet email newsletter. It's such a privilege to be on this mailing list because it's really become the highlight of my week. I feel like I barely have to comment on it at all. Any rational person will just stare and laugh. Nonetheless, let's begin the breakdown.

When explaining their beliefs, Christians often feel they must first prove the Bible or prove the existence of God. This approach reveals that they do not yet understand the Bible’s approach, known as presuppositional apologetics.

If I recall correctly, the creationist Eric Hovind likes to talk a lot about "evolutionists'" presuppositions about the theory, stating that they start off assuming that it's true and look for evidence to support it. (We all know that's not the case and that's not how science works, but let's not focus on that now.) It's actually funny how AiG is now trying to turn the tables on us and tell us that this is how Christian apologetics are supposed to work. However, this wouldn't be the first time that two Christian ministries tell us completely opposite things.

Presuppositions are simply beliefs that everyone has that affect how they think, view the world, interpret evidence, and read the Bible. Apologetics is a reasoned defense of beliefs. So presuppositional apologetics is a reasoned defense of Christian beliefs based on recognizing our presuppositions.

Presuppositions are not merely beliefs, they are beliefs that rest upon assumptions. Clearly, if this is how far back Christian apologetics has been set back - that they must now rely on assumptions - the surely, they must be a dying cause. However, it's difficult for me to tell what sense of assumption they're talking about here, so I'll have to give them some benefit of the doubt. If they perhaps mean that the presuppositions are things that people believe prior to engaging in a discussion, then I can accept that as somewhat reasonable.

For instance, our presupposition is that God exists and He has given us His Word (the Bible) that is absolute truth. So we use the Bible as the basis for how to think, interpret evidence, explain the world around us, and read the Bible. An atheist’s presupposition will most likely be that there is no God and that truth is relative. An atheist believes that man decides truth, and so he thinks, interprets evidence, and views the world and Bible accordingly.

Whoa, whoa now. Slow down. Why start throwing out falsities right at the end of your letter? I already had enough to deal with here. If you're a Christian trying to dialogue with a non-believer, you simply can't rely on your presuppositions to be convincing. Maybe Christians don't understand this - after all, I get quoted plenty of Bible verses that claim I'm wrong and am destined to an eternal hell, but why should I care? If you're a Christian, my quoting the Koran or Vedas to you won't be any kind of effective. Why do you think it will be any different in my case? It may be tough, but you have to dig deeper until you can arrive at something upon which to debate that does not rely upon mutually conflicting presuppositions. You just won't get anywhere otherwise.

But really, why do butcher the atheist's position so terribly? Most atheists don't believe there is no god, they just lack beliefs in any. There's a difference (though it's probably irrelevant to you). I don't know of any atheist that think the truth is relative, but if one ever did say that, I'd ask him, "Is that statement absolutely or only relatively true?" That's a self-defeating statement. I believe the difference between Christianity and atheism is the idea that we can attain absolute truth. Simply because it exists does not mean we can always know it, and the fact that we don't know everything about anything means that we probably never do. What I think is truth is based on empirical evidence confirmed by other unbiased sources - not the books of the Bible which were written in a time of mass ignorance. (Though I don't mean to imply that the Bible is totally ignorant on all issues, because it's not. There are good things to be found in it, to be sure, but there are also many bad and incorrect things.)

I don't believe that man decides truth any more than rocks define it. Truth is "what is," and what is, is, independent of us wanting to believe it (or being able to know or even understand the concept of any arbitrarily chosen truth). No, Christians are the ones that rely on man to decide truth. Men wrote the bible and men are responsible for what is inside it, in every way. Slapping the label "divinely inspired" on the cover and calling it inerrant and forever true (no matter what the opposition) is a novel idea, but doesn't make it any more true than a documentary with Michael Moore's signature on it.

Are your morals against the law?

Oh Answers in Genesis, how I love your emails. They're as entertaining as the majority of TV shows that get poor ratings. You've titled this letter "Are your morals against the law?" and I get the feeling the answer I'm supposed to be inferring is 'yes'. Insulting, but let's move on, hm?

A: There’s no doubt America was founded on Christian principles based on the Bible. In fact, just two generations ago, the majority of Americans supported prayer, Scripture readings, and Bible instruction in public schools. Britain’s Common Law also was founded on biblical authority. In both countries, people also supported displaying nativity scenes, crosses, and the Ten Commandments in public places. Gay marriage and abortion were outlawed.

I find room for doubt. I don't have to be any kind of historical scholar to reason that "just two generations ago" is not the same as "two hundred years ago." Don't pull that crap on me. And what does the Britain Common Law have to do with the way America was founded? BS. Name me one "Christian principle" that America was founded on that is uniquely Christian in nature. (Hint: freedom of speech and freedom of religion are not in the bible - in fact, they are spoken against. boom! roasted.) It's not even that I don't support the display of nativity scenes, crosses, or the Ten Commandments in public places, because I don't care. I just don't think they should be displayed on government property because that violates the separation. The Ten Commandments are largely unrelated to US laws at all, except for the "don't kill" and "don't steal" ones. And of course there is absolutely no place in a government building for "no other gods except for Yahweh." If you want to put up your plaques on private property, go ahead. But not in state-owned buildings. Oh, and interracial marriages were also illegal. Does your bible support the ban on black/white or white/asian love?

Today, however, it is very obvious that the population as a whole does not see the Bible as the absolute authority it once did. For instance, pollster George Barna found that in the United States, “A minority of born-again adults (44 percent) and an even smaller proportion of born-again teenagers (9 percent) are certain of the existence of absolute moral truth.” Similar surveys in the United Kingdom reveal even lower percentages.

Wait - you're equivocating "lack of certainty of absolute moral truth" with "the Bible is not the absolute authority"? I swear AiG, you just love equivocation. I don't find the Bible a source of "absolute moral truth" because it isn't one. It's full of stories about god-approved/-commanded genocide, rape, slavery, torture, polygamy, and dishonesty. If there is such a thing as absolute moral truth, it won't be found here.

So what has happened? Why the dramatic change? Why is the moral position of previous generations being outlawed more and more? What has driven this moral collapse? Why is this war going on?

Wait, is not supporting prayer in public schools a mark of moral collapse? Aren't crime rates lower now than they were "just two generations ago"? Maybe, in this age of easily accessible knowledge and free speech, it's easier than ever to check religious claims against fact and find them wanting.

Whereas Christian thinking once permeated the public education system, today the Christian God, prayer, Bible study, and biblical creation have all but been excluded from the system. Now, generations (including the majority of students from church homes) are being trained in a secular (anti-God) religion. They are being indoctrinated to believe that the universe—and all that exists within it—can be explained without God.

That's because it can. The Christian God, prayer, and Bible study have no place in "the system" except for in religion class. Because that's what it is. You wouldn't have it any other way if this were somehow a "Muslim" or "Mormon" nation. And don't get me started on biblical creation. It's not science. It never has been. To teach it as such is a disgrace to real science and to pretend that there's some kind of discord among scientists (as you would preach) is simply dishonest. Because there isn't. And you aren't scientists. You're propagandists. You pretend to be an authority on a subject and permeate religious fundamentalist circles with your disinformation. You are either ignorant or knowingly deceitful. So no, I won't give you my money.

And to answer your initial question ("are my morals against the law?"), no. And neither are christian morals. There's a difference in a belief in right and wrong behavior and the belief that your religion should be spread all over our government. And the latter is what should be illegal.

Creationist Inanity

I've long switched from accepting the delusion of wishful thinking to the reality of science, but I'm still subscribed to the creationist propaganda machine Answers In Genesis's weekly newsletter. It provides me with at least a good chuckle now and then, but as time goes on it just gets more absurd. So, for my own enjoyment, I'd like to go through it piece by piece and show just how shallow their arguments are.

"Evolution requires death. At its core, Darwin’s postulate appeals to the power of death to remove those less able to survive so that the “more fit” can take their place. Natural selection, in this Darwinian sense, toils mindlessly on, removing individuals, populations, and even entire species. Whether something—or someone—lives or suffers, Darwinism offers only the cold machinations of time and death. Anything more would require existential purpose, after all, and that cannot be allowed."

It's interesting how creationists always use the term "Darwinism" as a pejorative, as though everything we know now relies on what Charles Darwin thought 150 years ago. Nonetheless, assuming for the moment that the term is synonymous with "evolutionary theory," we'll move on. Life requires death. Even in the so-called perfect Garden of Eden, you still have animals that require meat to survive (aka carnivores). Thus, no matter how you slice it, death is just a part of the world. The laws of nature and the laws of physics don't see anything special about death - it's just how the world operates. You may personally see death in a negative light due to your metaphysical perceptions or beliefs, but that doesn't change what is or should be. Everything that happens in this world is the result of "cold machinations of time" - it's just a fact. And who ever said that purpose is or isn't a part of evolutionary theory? Is there a purpose to stars forming and exploding in space, especially ones outside our short range of view? If not, then why should we assume anything more about the natural laws that operate on our small planet?

"Evolution, in an atheistic worldview, is morally neutral. When tragedies strike, evolution cannot tell us something is detrimental. Death, after all, can neither be untimely or tragic, since death is the means by which “progress” is made."

Another creationist assumption - that evolution is solely a part of an atheistic worldview. There are millions of Christians that do believe in the fact of evolution (and it isn't required for atheism either, just for future reference). Is it a tragedy when an ape, fox, or mosquito dies due to natural (or unnatural) causes? Progress happens when animals are born with more advantageous traits, not when living animals die.

"If we take the idea of “survival of the fittest” to its logical conclusion, it seems almost absurd for anyone who accepts the story of evolution to think of death as being the enemy. Whether through human actions, animal attacks, or natural disasters, what value can we attach to those lives if they are nothing more than “stardust” after billions of years?"

It depends who's putting value on the lives. Value is, after all, a human conception and not a physical variable. But again, it's not the death that is useful to evolution but the appearance of more useful traits that are passed along to new members of the population. To answer the rhetorical question, it depends what lives we're talking about. I don't, for example, place any value to the lives of bedbugs, mosquitoes, tomatoes, potatoes, or fish. I place a value on human lives and the lives of animals that I deem worthy for personal or societal reasons.

"In fact, the consistent atheist could even rejoice that nature has eliminated competitors for resources with the death of those unable to survive such events. Of course, few, if any, rational humans would hold this viewpoint, and atheism certainly doesn’t remove compassion. However, this is the ultimate fruit of Darwin’s anti-God philosophy: no death can be bad according to evolution."

They could rejoice. Or they might not. Whether people do or not has nothing to do with their views on a god. There is some beauty to be had in nature, but there is also some ugliness. I wish that viruses could be wiped out, that poisonous plants that could kill me would wither away, and that any animal that tries to attack me would drop dead as I punch it in the face, but nature doesn't care what I want. Atheism doesn't remove compassion because atheism is simply the lack of a belief in God - nothing more, nothing less. Darwin didn't have an anti-God philosophy any more than Galileo did when he discovered that the sun didn't revolve around the earth. It may contradict a literal interpretation of the Genesis story/ies in chapters 1 and 2, but that would at most make it an anti-God philosophy, not an anti-god one. Death can be good or bad, and it's especially bad in the case of my death.

This four-paragraph blurb is nothing more than an equivocating appeal to consequence and it even fails at that. Creationists are desperate to push their agendas on anyone willing to listen, but there's a reason nobody takes them seriously. That obvious reason is because the pseudo-science crap being shoveled out by the bagful at their website and museum is demonstrably wrong and is understood to be by anyone with a basic understanding of what evolutionary theory actually says. It's hard to believe that an organization like AiG continues to exist in an era where scientific information is so readily available to anyone willing to spend a few minutes reading. It's either ignorance or selective trust, but there's one thing I've always noticed about the informed - you can either be a Creationist or honest, pick one.

If you disagree, by all means leave me a comment.