Is It Possible To Remake Creationism Into A Scientific Theory?

[Moontanman]

The Fossil Record

 

Reads like an "eye dee ten tea" problem to me.

[Shubee]

To be clear, you're saying you believe that some religious MD who runs his own website has therein provided sufficient refutation of thousands of pieces of peer-reviewed, published evidence spanning the fields of geology, paleontology, and genetics(to name a few).

 

You're not even close to grasping my meaning. Buffy understood my intent almost perfectly. I'm asking a question:

 

Suppose we take the view that quantum physics is science. If we adjoin to quantum physics all of the untestable, far-reaching mathematical implications of quantum physics, would we still have a scientific theory?

 

You have to understand that this is an incredibly extraordinary claim to make. Especially given that the author of the website supports many fringe theories such as the religious pseudoscience of Michael Behe, which has been (almost unanimously) rejected by the science community and legal system as such.

 

I have very little respect for Michael Behe as a defender of creationism. My purpose in citing The Fossil Record was to present a visual representation of my third postulate:

 

As for evidence that supports my third postulate, I'm very impressed by the utter simplicity of the observation that many petrified trees in the fossil record extend vertically through millions and millions of years of sedimentary rock.

 

Actually, I don't see anything too unbelievable in Sean D. Pitman's explanation of The Fossil Record.

 

These statements were meant to convey the idea that however fantastically improbable quantum creationism may be when I adjoin to standard quantum physics my second and third postulate, I really do believe that my three-pronged axiomatized system is consistent and therefore meets the definition of science according to David Hilbert's philosophy of physics.

 

Please understand that I'm not trying to prove quantum creationism true. I'm only trying to prove that quantum creationism is a logically consistent science. Just think of it as a word game that mathematicians like to play.

 

For those of you who want to know, David Hilbert's Philosophy of Physics basically boils down to the proposition that Physics should be dealt with entirely with abstract Mathematics,..

 

Correct. And you are probably aware that Hilbert's philosophy of mathematics has been summarized by the well-known attribution: "Mathematics is a game played according to certain simple rules with meaningless marks on paper."

[CraigD]

Thank you CraigD but my aim is only to show that quantum creationism is rightly called science according to an acceptable definition of science.

The most widely accepted definition of science is the one I gave above: a process of theory (AKA explanation) being used to make predictions which are tested (AKA validated or falsified) by experiment.

I prefer the view of science as given in David Hilbert's philosophy of physics …

There is a critical flaw with this approach: Hilbert’s approach to math, and by extension, physical science, generally known as formalism, is based on the assumption that a formal mathematical system isomorphic to physical reality that is complete, consistent, and decidable, exists. However, Gödel's incompleteness theorems prove that this assumption is untrue, not only for a fully reality-describing formal system, but even for a simpler system with a finite alphabet and the usual arithmetic operations.

 

This is certainly not to say that formalism is ineffective or bad, but rather that it is not innately superior to less than fully mathematically formal processes, but rather is practically useful as a tool in less formal processes. Though you’d be had pressed to find a more ardent proponent of formalism than me, even I stop short of agreeing with Shubee’s preference for formalism over experimentally verified science.

 

Another problem with formalism, which I and everyone I’ve read or spoken to with practical experience with formalism acknowledge, is that it’s very difficult. If one insists on accepting and applying only formally proven propositions, one would be incapable of practically any application of knowledge. Even with modern computer resources and personal genius, the amount of time necessary to follow Hilbert’s program to a point where this were not the case would likely take more than a human lifetime, which is beyond the bounds of most humans’ patience.

…so the only question that remains is if quantum theory contradicts my other two axioms.

 

"The second and third fundamental assumption of quantum creationism is the theory of devolution and the postulate that the fossil record was caused by a single, fantastic, global flood catastrophe."

There are at least a couple of problem with this approach.

 

First, in a mathematically formal sense, there are not axioms, because they are not described in terms of an enumerated collection of terms (an alphabet) and operations within some formal system. This requirement is difficult to explain tersely – to understand it, if the reader does not already, I recommend reading chapter 14 of Hofstadter’s “Gödel, Escher, Bach”, and its supporting internal and external referenced.

 

Second, there is a well-know gap in the knowledge domain of quantum mechanics and disciplines such as biology, paleontology, and geology. Even using the best present approximation methods and computer resources, we are not able use rigorous quantum mechanical formalism to describe even a single living cell. While quantum mechanics has provided interesting intuitive speculations into at least neurology (eg: Penrose’s “physics of consciousness”), present-day techniques and resources appear far from able to support a practical theory of “quantum biology”, etc.

 

If a theory of “quantum Darwinian evolutionary biology” in presently unfeasible, so is a theory of “quantum creationism”.

[CraigD]

Of course evolution is *not* more improbable unless one ignores much well-verified theory--both pure mathematics and experimental--of complex systems.

I don't mind anyone saying that the probability for creation through quantum creationism is infinitesimal. How much more probable could the theory of evolution be? Look at it this way: Suppose the mathematical probability is 1/googolplex for some inanimate material on an earth-like planet to assemble itself into a great variety of living things in 3 days. Also suppose that the probability for a slow, multiple billion year life-creating process is 10^12 times greater.

Without evidence supporting these suppositions - for specific approximate numbers, specific calculations showing how they were arrived at – it strikes me as no more reasonable to suppose them than to suppose that a host of angels are physically sitting around my kitchen table offering firsthand testimony to the literal veracity of specific stories from the Bible book of Genesis.

 

I believe Buffy is correct in her assertion that Darwinian evolution is much more likely an explanation for present day observation than Biblical creationism. Shubee, do you have any evidence to support the suppositions you offer? :)

 

PS:

And you are probably aware that Hilbert's philosophy of mathematics has been summarized by the well-known attribution: "Mathematics is a game played according to certain simple rules with meaningless marks on paper."

IMHO, these sort of statements are some of the best brief summaries of formalism. I encountered one first in when I read GEB in 1980 – Hofstadter terms what they describe “typographical rules”, and uses the idea extensively throughout the book.

[questor]

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

[Moontanman]

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

 

Mainly because the Conservative Christian right demands it! Creationism has historically only applied to life on the Earth. You are the first creationist I know of who has claimed it applies only to the beginning of the universe instead. Creationism could be turned into science the way a turd could be jewelry, no matter how you shape it it's still ****.

[Buffy]

Shubee appears to be arguing that "anything is possible, therefore the unbelievably improbable proposition that a great flood produced the incredibly ordered layering must be accepted as a reasonable hypothesis."

Actually, I don't see anything too unbelievable in Sean D. Pitman's explanation of The Fossil Record.

Well, of course not. Unfortunately Mr. Pitman is highly selective in his choice of "examples," and if you'd like to digress into a discussion of any of his points, I guess I'd be glad to entertain you. Suffice it to say that he does not address--mostly because he is promoting "Intelligent Design" as opposed to "Young Earth Creationism"--the issue that the Great Flood theory of geologic observations relies on a stochastic process that would require physical causes for the observed ordering that are in direct contradiction with known--and reproducible--laws of hydrodynamics. How this layering occurs in perfect correlation with a variety of dating methods is at the very least--as both Craig and Freeztar have noted--many, many orders of magnitude more improbable than Evolution, and indeed, as I later stated, would really require the temporary suspension of physical laws in order to achieve.

The theory of devolution agrees with Darwin that there are living things that reproduce with variation but says that all life is spiraling downward toward extinction and death, not upward to more glorious forms of life.

The "theory of devolution" is based almost exclusively on a purposeful misinterpretation of Evolution.

 

Evolution DOES NOT say that the result is "ever increasing complexity" or even "improvement." "Better" is a function of the *specific environment*, and is NOT some sort of abstract truth about superiority. As the article you linked does indeed show examples of "devolution" but that is fundamentally irrelevant in either finding fault with Evolution: Evolution makes no such claim, and to use this as the basis for finding such fault is a "Straw Man Argument."

 

As Bob Dylan once said, "the first one now will later be last, for the times they are a changin'." Hard to come up with a *better* evolutionary explanation for the "conundrum" you are trying to show here.

 

Oddly enough however, calls to devolution are in fact a great argument against Creationism, since it requires an explanation for why an Intelligent Creator would cause devolution to occur. Why would urchins and starfish be punished with the removal of their brains? What did they do to deserve such treatment?

As for evidence that supports my third postulate, I'm very impressed by the utter simplicity of the observation that many petrified trees in the fossil record extend vertically through millions and millions of years of sedimentary rock.

Well, I'd encourage you to read the paper by Dr. Harold Coffin "The Yellowstone Petrified "Forests" which is cited on that page: you'll find that it really does not support the argument that such layers around petrified trees is somehow unusual, and in fact in its addendum, it shows how the process is actually being replicated in Spirit Lake near Mt. St. Helens post its 1980 erruption!

 

Trees fossilize, and if they are surrounded by sediment that initially develops and washes away, that paper explains why they do indeed do so in situ, thus causing "millions of years"--something that is clearly creative license with the facts--of sediment to grow around them.

 

This is just one of the many ways in which "mainstream" Creationist theory has distorted existing data that actually disproves what it claims to prove.

Quantum indeterminancy is only a related concept. And quantum theory does make creationism possible. Physicists already admit that a highly ordered reality can suddenly materialize out of nothingness and then become increasingly disordered and decay into inevitable extinction and non-existence.

But none of what you've stated here makes "creationism possible." All you've pointed to is the fact that yes, complex systems--with the input of large amounts of energy (to ensure no violation of the laws of Conservation of Energy)--*can*--although not always--create more complexity "out of nothing," and then yes decay just as easily.

 

These processes can be demonstrated with very simple--and entirely mathematical--system, that require no call to an outside, metaphysical creator: they come into existence simply based on known and quite obvious laws of mathematics.

 

We can get into interesting philosophical arguments about the nature of mathematics of course, and the Platonic notion of mathematical truth as transcending "physical truth" (an excellent discussion of which you will find in Chapter 1 of Roger Penrose's Road to Reality, to utilize your own reference!): Is it possible to argue that the Creator could create mathematics arbitrarily to suit Her notions of what reality should be? If not, then given that what we see is entirely explainable through abstract mathematical truth, the notion of a Creator is not only unnecessary in the sense of Occam, it is by definition unprovable!

It's not astoundingly improbable. Evolutionists readily admit to ancient catastrophes all over the planet. And geologists teach multiple mega-floods as scientific fact. I think it's highly likely that there is no clear and indisputable fact that prevents all these multiple mega-floods and fantastic catastrophes from being simultaneous events.

Well, except for that carbon-14 data....you see, in spite of calls to its "inaccuracy" you apparently missed the point: you can *ignore* its exact alignment--which can easily be explained by error ranges due to specific environmental variations for which there is no direct evidence in specific samples--but still get *relative* datings that must align. Its as simple as this: layers that are obviously undisturbed can show differences in "accuracy" that are well within statistical deviations. You do not find items that are close in undisturbed physical strata that are hundreds of thousands or millions of years apart with no obvious explanation: the trees you reference above are dated to the strata *at their roots*, not randomly assorted as one would find in a typical "catastrophe."

 

Simply by making calls to "obvious catastrophes" of quite small scale, you do not explain how not only there was a global catastrophe, but that it had the ability to disturb layers of geological strata that cannot be moved by any amount of water thrown at it over a space of 40 days.

 

My favorite theory of the Great Flood is that of a natural dam/waterfall at the Bosporous that in a very short period of time broke and inundated a then mostly dry Black Sea, for which there is some significant--although not conclusive--physical evidence. The interesting thing about this particular theory is that it well-explains the historical story, while it shows that the effects of such a hydrological inundation--while quite devastating to the local inhabitants--did almost nothing to the geological record. In fact there's little physical evidence at all!

 

Have you asked yourself the question: what sort of hydrological action would be *required* to cause the evidence of geological strata to exist? Those provided by sites like Answers In Genesis are unfortunately laughably incomplete and provide nothing but issue after issue with the actual data that is never addressed because, well, there's no alternative explanation that would allow such geological evidence to be created by a "really big storm."

 

Monkey men all, in business suit, teachers and critics all dance the poot, :phones:

Buffy

[CraigD]

Someone please explain to me why we have to argue floods and dates when we try to determine whether or not the universe was created? Why do we only consider a mythical happening one one infinintesimal planet?

Forum-wide, we don’t. The idea that various religious creation stories are metaphorical rather than literal is an interesting, if centuries old, one, worthy of many threads. However, this thread is about the idea that a particular creation story could be literally, because, according to some interpretations of quantum physics, nearly anything can be true.

 

We’ve not yet much discussed in this thread the concept of interpretations of theories of quantum physics, as opposed to the theories themselves, in particular the many-worlds interpretation, which explains the probabilistic nature of quantum physics with the idea that everything that can happen actually does in some “alternate universe”, or world-line. According to this interpretation, in some universe other than our own, the most literal reading of the Genesis account actually happened. In another, the clearly factious one of Flying Spaghetti Monsterism happened. In another, a creation story never imagined in our universe happened.

 

In yet others, some past happened, then the universe spontaneously changed so that all evidence reveals that something different happened. In some “chaos” world-lines, pasts and futures are so disjoint that, for all practical purposes, causation is not a meaningful concept

 

In short, in some universe, any arbitrary creation story, including every completely senseless one, happened.

 

The MWI is well known and very controversial. One of the major objections to it is that, in it’s pure form, it’s physically irrelevant. The many world-lines are causally unconnected, which means that, by definition, they can’t interact in any way. In a sense, separate world-lines are less than imaginary, as even imaginary worlds are real in the sense that they exist as configurations of neurons and chemicals in the brains of the people imagining them. Alternate world are not even connected to our universe in this manner – there’s no causal link between them and our universe whatever.

 

IMHO, a similar objection applies to any sort of “quantum theory of creation”. Any arbitrary past might possibly have occurred, but the practical value of this, scientific or religious, is nothing.

[Shubee]

I prefer the view of science as given in David Hilbert's philosophy of physics …

There is a critical flaw with this approach: Hilbert’s approach to math, and by extension, physical science, generally known as formalism, ...

CraigD,

 

Your argument here is incorrect. It's true that Hilbert's original ideas on formalism were overly ambitious. But even the Wikipedia article you cite says, "Much of Hilbert's program can be salvaged by changing its goals slightly." Also, it's widely recognized by mathematicians that Hilbert's intellectual achievements on the foundations of mathematics were revolutionary. More to the point, there is simply no significant connection between David Hilbert's Philosophy of Physics and Hilbert's efforts to prove the consistency of mathematics.

[questor]

Since we can only observe one universe and barely understand it, why should we belabor some mathematical exercises which could theoretically allow for others? Maybe if the math was more pure, we wouldn't have the conjecture.

Since a majority of posters agree there is no God as is described in the Bible, (or other religious tomes) why don't we argue the possiblity that the world was created by some all powerful agent? If there was a BB, wouldn't there have to be a cause? If the universe is ordered and works by physical laws, does that not point to cause? There was cause or there was no cause. Is there any thing whatsoever that would point to no cause?

[Shubee]

Suffice it to say that he does not address... the issue that the Great Flood theory of geologic observations relies on a stochastic process that would require physical causes for the observed ordering that are in direct contradiction with known--and reproducible--laws of hydrodynamics. How this layering occurs in perfect correlation with a variety of dating methods is at the very least...many, many orders of magnitude more improbable than Evolution, and indeed, as I later stated, would really require the temporary suspension of physical laws in order to achieve.

That's a very nicely stated claim. Can you also supply the proof?

 

The "theory of devolution" is based almost exclusively on a purposeful misinterpretation of Evolution.

 

Evolution DOES NOT say that the result is "ever increasing complexity" or even "improvement." "Better" is a function of the *specific environment*, and is NOT some sort of abstract truth about superiority. As the article you linked does indeed show examples of "devolution" but that is fundamentally irrelevant in either finding fault with Evolution: Evolution makes no such claim, and to use this as the basis for finding such fault is a "Straw Man Argument."

 

I regard the mechanism "survival of the fittest" as a tautology and consider the claim that scientists never insinuate religious, long-term conclusions for the theory of evolution as clever propaganda. If evolution in biology only means change over time, then I suppose that I'm a creationist-evolutionist that accepts natural selection.

 

Have you ever watched the series, The Ascent of Man on TV? Ascent means "movement upward from a lower to a higher state, degree, grade, or status; advancement." That's exactly what many evolutionary scientists teach. See this video:

 

COSMOS - Clip 5 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQrkJchlldA.

Oddly enough however, calls to devolution are in fact a great argument against Creationism, since it requires an explanation for why an Intelligent Creator would cause devolution to occur.

 

I prefer to look at the evidence scientifically. To me, the theory of devolution is as certain as the creation of the universe in an initial highly ordered state, which, by all accounts, is unquestionably increasingly decaying toward an inevitable cosmic death.

 

This is just one of the many ways in which "mainstream" Creationist theory has distorted existing data that actually disproves what it claims to prove.

 

This thread is about quantum creationism, not mainstream creationist theory.

 

But none of what you've stated here makes "creationism possible."

 

There are physicists that believe that the fantastically improbable is impossible. There are mathematicians that believe that even events of zero probability can happen. I take the side of the mathematicians.

 

The notion of a Creator is not only unnecessary in the sense of Occam, it is by definition unprovable!

 

I am not invoking a Creator in the background for quantum creation theory. If there are mathematical statements in arithmetic that are unprovable, why should I be troubled by the existence of God being unprovable?

 

Simply by making calls to "obvious catastrophes" of quite small scale, you do not explain how not only there was a global catastrophe, but that it had the ability to disturb layers of geological strata that cannot be moved by any amount of water thrown at it over a space of 40 days.

 

Have you asked yourself the question: what sort of hydrological action would be *required* to cause the evidence of geological strata to exist? ... there's no alternative explanation that would allow such geological evidence to be created by a "really big storm."

 

I have merely stated three postulates. Can you really prove that no fantastic quantum mechanical explanation exists that might justify the third postulate?

 

Here's someone with enough imagination to at least believe that the third postulate is conceivable:

 

YouTube - The Biblical Flood Explained http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X16SE-N-8ys

[questor]

Suppose there was a flood in ancient times. Suppose someone built a large boat. Since the Bible is a collection of stories written by a primitive people about the very circumscribed area in which they lived, what do the above stories prove? Suppose the flood enveloped the whole planet, could the millions of varieties of life be packed into the Ark? How much water did they drink? Where did they get their food? What do any of the Biblical stories prove, even if correct?

[pgrmdave]

What do any of the Biblical stories prove, even if correct?

 

This is an important question to ask, and one too often overlooked.

[Buffy]

Suffice it to say that he does not address... the issue that the Great Flood theory of geologic observations relies on a stochastic process that would require physical causes for the observed ordering that are in direct contradiction with known--and reproducible--laws of hydrodynamics. How this layering occurs in perfect correlation with a variety of dating methods is at the very least...many, many orders of magnitude more improbable than Evolution, and indeed, as I later stated, would really require the temporary suspension of physical laws in order to achieve.

That's a very nicely stated claim. Can you also supply the proof?

Sure, its easy. The Great Flood would require the complete physical displacement, up to and exceeding complete liquefaction of at least the top 5 miles of at least all of the continental surfaces of the Earth. Extremely large earthquakes can cause such liquefaction in pure sandy soils that are already partially hydrated, however the amount of energy required to do this planet wide, not just in sandy soils, would require far more energy than could be produced by any force other than a massive innundation of meteorites. If enough meteorites hit the Earth's surface to provide the requisite energy, even perfectly distributed, it would have resulted in both the complete evaporation of all water on the surface of the earth--ejecting most of it into space--and would have resulted in the entire surface of the earth becoming molten, obliterating all traces of "Pre-Adamite" species.

 

That's just one approach though: you could try to explain it by gravity weakening to a small fraction of its current value for the length of the deluge (although that would have caused some significant problems for folks on any boat floating in the ocean!), but even then, pure hydrologic soaking will not stir anything beyond the top layer, and there would also have to be an odd effect of the gravitational weakening that would cause layers to be formed in perfect alignment with carbon-14 concentrations, for which there is no known physical force.

 

We can go on and on like this if you'd like, but the fact is that it is indeed physically impossible to create what we see here in 40-days without breaking physical laws. If you'd like to show how its possible, please do so.

 

But this is just a sideshow of course, the fundamental flaw is still your first postulate "there is no limit to improbability in quantum theory." This is quite vague, and at the very least requires much more definition. As I read it, it translates into "if there is quantum randomness, then any state of reality is possible *instantaneously*," where--to apply your third postulate--"40 days and 40 nights is sufficiently short to constitute "instantaneous."

 

We can certainly conceive of *some universe* where the physical laws are such that something like this would happen, but *our universe* certainly has different ones, and *that* universe would look nothing like our own!

 

But within our own universe, time makes virtually anything possible, and the only thing that you add here is the "Creationist" notion that it was created this way, and nothing came before.

 

The question then becomes, why is this a necessary postulate? What explanatory power does it add to say that the Earth sprang into being instantaneously?

Have you ever watched the series, The Ascent of Man on TV? Ascent means "movement upward from a lower to a higher state, degree, grade, or status; advancement." That's exactly what many evolutionary scientists teach.

Well, of course the series was almost exclusively about the development of human *culture* and *knowledge* and had almost nothing to say about evolution.

 

Could you come up with a more relevant citation to try to prove this point? Its quite clearly fallacious, although it is a *frequently used* argument among those who argue against evolution. Again, this is an excellent example of a Straw Man argument.

I prefer to look at the evidence scientifically. To me, the theory of devolution is as certain as the creation of the universe in an initial highly ordered state, which, by all accounts, is unquestionably increasingly decaying toward an inevitable cosmic death.

Do you invest in the stock market? Over the long run it does indeed go up. Over the short-term you see all sorts of "devolution." Over the extremely long run, we'll probably become the next Rome and it will all go to hell in a handbasket....but then then next civilization will come along....what is devolution? You seem to argue that it is a monotonically decreasing function.

 

I would hope that as a mathematician that you would be able to distinguish between a monotonically decreasing function and a stochastic data set. I hope also you have an appreciation for how functions (in the real word, the physical laws) impose order on stochastic data: add a Poisson distributed data set to a sine wave, and you'll have a pretty jagged sine wave, but Fourier will still find the sine wave!

 

The notion of "complexity" is that where feedback loops in processes exist, over time, random inputs can change the elemental functions and add new ones by duplication and bifurcation.

 

These changes can either improve *or* damage the ability of the system to be suited to the *particular environment.*

 

As an example, fish have the ability to extract oxygen from water by absorbing it. Many fish have evolved very efficient mechanisms to perform this process, but now that they find themselves in heavily polluted environments, those with more efficient gills find they also more efficiently absorb toxins making them *less* well suited to the environment.

 

I would not digress into this elemental description of evolution except for the fact that you have so badly misstated its key premises.

This thread is about quantum creationism, not mainstream creationist theory.

Fair enough, but given that, you still need to deal with the objection that so far, your postulate *assumes* that "quantum randomness makes any configuration of physical matter possible in 'instantaneous' time scales," a notion that needs to be supported before we can go anywhere.

 

In the meantime, while "traditional Creationist" arguments might be argued to be off-topic, they are the inevitable next step, because unless you can provide a basis for the "anything is possible instantaneously" argument, then the physical laws that these "traditional" arguments try to explain away, are indeed germane to the discussion.

There are mathematicians that believe that even events of zero probability can happen. I take the side of the mathematicians.

Can you cite one?

I have merely stated three postulates. Can you really prove that no fantastic quantum mechanical explanation exists that might justify the third postulate?

Just to repeat, in order to justify even your first postulate, you must describe how quantum randomness makes anything possible instantaneously: from a purely mathematical viewpoint, you cannot make the effects of the functions that define a model disappear completely, no matter how much stochastic noise is created. I am not making any claim based on improbability here, simply a basic understanding of how interrelated functions in a model interact.

 

If you really wanted to go somewhere with this, I'd strongly recommend throwing out your second and third postulates for now, and simply deal with trying to prove that anything is always possible.

 

We gain our ends only with the laws of nature; we control her only by understanding her laws, :)

Buffy

[Shubee]

The Great Flood would require the complete physical displacement, up to and exceeding complete liquefaction of at least the top 5 miles of at least all of the continental surfaces of the Earth. Extremely large earthquakes can cause such liquefaction in pure sandy soils that are already partially hydrated, however the amount of energy required to do this planet wide, not just in sandy soils, would require far more energy than could be produced by any force other than a massive innundation of meteorites. ...

 

We can go on and on like this if you'd like, but the fact is that it is indeed physically impossible to create what we see here in 40-days without breaking physical laws. If you'd like to show how its possible, please do so.

 

My guess is that you are using Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7.0 with the default setting, which is set to not let you see any embedded YouTube videos. The second YouTube video in my last post on page 3 answers 'how it is possible' directly.

 

Could you come up with a more relevant citation to try to prove this point? Its quite clearly fallacious, although it is a *frequently used* argument among those who argue against evolution. Again, this is an excellent example of a Straw Man argument.

 

The first video in my preceding post clearly shows, according to evolutionists, how man evolved out of ooze in the primordial soup. That's quite a transformation. That was my proof.

[questor]

This argument has been beaten to death because of the attempt to justify Biblical myths, which can't be done. If it were possible by quantum theory to say the flood occurred, it would still have to occur in the time span of man, with enough engineering knowledge to build a boat. Does geology

substantiate this occurrence? If the Red Sea parted, it would have to happen exactly when the Israelites were leaving Egypt. Is there evidence of this?

Why do we continue to attempt to justify the Bible as a true account when

there are so many exaggerations and parables in it?

Why not argue creationism from the standpoint of causality or non-causality? This is where the truth will be found.

[HydrogenBond]

Bible stories served the purpose of creating a lesson. It is loosely analogous to children's fable. I am not saying it is just a fable only it was there to teach a lesson. Relative to the great flood story, the reason it occurred, that is given, is god was mad at the sorry state of humanity. I am only telling the account and not placing any value judgement.

 

Relative to an ancient person hearing this account, they would be made more cautious about ignoring similar warnings about divine insight. Whatever behavior was included for the punishment of the story, would be resisted with more will power. I am not making a moral judgement only trying to guess how this story would affect the next generation of humans who heard it. They could not go back to the good old days of distorted instinct. The past was washed away in the story and a new path was given with the world refreshed. Noah hand picks the best animals and not the defective and mutant ones. The chosen animals seem to have an instinct for survival and migrate to the ark. The defective animals are eliminated with the defective and mutant humans. This is the lesson. Whether this occurred or not, it had an impact.

 

Here is an analogy of the debate. We start with the fable of the tortoise and hare. The lesson to be gained is steady perseverance can often do better than a bi-polar attitude of manic and lazy. Not a bad lesson to teach. Science says, we have data that proves that neither rabbits or turtles can talk or organize a race. Therefore, since this is not possible, except with quantum mechanics, the lesson you are trying to teach has no value. We conclude manic/lazy is good as perseverance. This way we don't hurt feelings and get the PC police to boycott further funding to your project. I look at this story, figuratively. It does not conflict with common sense and the science data, but still tells us something about social pushes that helped humanity to evolve.