The believers purpose for these Evol topics?

What does an "ad homen" insult look like? Oh never mind, I see it right there . . .

 

Where is the personal attack there?

In the first, I am questioning why you continue to misquote good people. I have been trying to shame you into not bearing flase witness for, well, years now. It does not work. I am not sure you can be shamed.

And in the second, I am agian expressing my opinioon that by taking quotations out of context that you sure are making a lot of noise. But since the quotations have a completely different meaning when the context is added, all of your noise really does not amount to much. Not so much a personal attack as trying to be a little witty by working in some literature.

 

I can see there will be no stopping you Bob!

I'll just add this $0.02.

There are many on both sides of this debate who already have their minds made up before doing the "research". That is true of many scientists who assume a priori that all creationists are idiots. But it is also true of many believers who set out to "disprove" evolution and already have their minds made up.

What most "noncreationist" Christians "do" is to try to be honest. Believing God above all else they see no problem in looking for the true explanation for what we see around us, whether it be 6 day creation or Darwinian evolution.

In your explanations Bob I see a less than accurate depiction of the "scientific position". I don not however know if this is from a lack of knowledge or simply a sincere desire to disprove evolution no matter what the argument.

 

"Never?" Let's look at your favorite quote.

Now you keep harping on your quotes about such things as "NEVER HAPPENED IN NATURE." Let's once again take a look at your quote and show how you take it out of context in order to build your case.

Let's even take that very quote. Simpson is historically your most abused quote.

You quote him as follows.

Now I am going to take a closer look at this quote.

Above, I make the argument that it was merely the tempo and mode of horse evolution which was being cited as wrong. I assert that all of these authors accpet the general story of the evolution of the horse and were merely pointing out the imcomplete knowledge of the earlier hypothesis.

You, on the other hand, keep asserting that they say that this is a story that never even happened. That is the whole basis for your thread, right.

Now as you look at the quote in context, you will see something. Your quote is part of a paragraph. Immediately after the sentence you quote, Simpson tells us exactly what he means by that sentence. And as ayou by now know, what he tells us is not that horse evolution "never happened in nature." He tells us that an orthogenetic mode of horse evolution "never happened in nature."

I have bolded the rest of the paragraph for you, the part you so conveniently leave out.

In context, it is quite apparent that is is the "uniform, continuous transformation" of the lineage that "never happened in nature." It might help to point out the sentence that preceeds the one you quote. "The evolution of the horse family included, indeed, certain trends, but none of these was undeviating or orthogenetic."

Taken together, one cannot miss that Simpson is discussing the tempo at which horse evolution occurred and is never once casting doubt on any transistional horse series or whether horse evolution is something that happened.

Read the paragraph. He talks about changes in size. He talks about changes in the number of toes. He talks about the pace and direction of change but never once does he ever say we where ever wrong about whther the change happened or that we where ever wrong about what happened.

You have seen this quote put back into context numerous times now. Why do you continue to insist that Simpson meant something other than what he said?

 

Hey BOB,

Why don't "YOU" chill out with the CAPS and the "quotation MARKS"? If your ARGUMENT needs "reinforcement" then all the CAPS and "quotation MARKS" in the WORLD are no SUBSTITUTE for ACTUAL "science" and "FACTS". It might "make" PEOPLE think that THERE IS NO "substance" to your "position", and that you "are" YELLING, so to speak.
Perhaps there "IS" some MISPLACED ANGER at "work" here?

 

Someone said in a post above: "error is not an option with the Word of God". How true! The Word of God is like a two-edged sword--it cuts through opinion, speculation, inference and prittle prattle.

That is why the world does not quote Him. They prefer to quote the Masters from Mars Hill, who are all still in their graves, by the way.

Jesus' tomb is empty. He is risen.

Cannot demonstrate that in a test tube either.

Now what?

Selah,

Bro. James

 

Hey, that's irking you too? Do you read a lot?? I was wondering why that bothers me so much, and I think it might be because I read a lot so I have practice in inserting intonation and inflection in my mind. When someone tries to insert intonation and inflection by using all caps, capitalizing the initial letter of random words, and putting stuff in quotation marks, it just puts my brain in overload.

Imagine if someone actually talked like that!

On a brighter note, I had the privilege of banning someone who used the same writing style on a different board a couple of years ago.

 

Hey, that's irking you too? Do you read a lot?? I was wondering why that bothers me so much, and I think it might be because I read a lot so I have practice in inserting intonation and inflection in my mind. When someone tries to insert intonation and inflection by using all caps, capitalizing the initial letter of random words, and putting stuff in quotation marks, it just puts my brain in overload.

Imagine if someone actually talked like that!

On a brighter note, I had the privilege of banning someone who used the same writing style on a different board a couple of years ago. </font>[/QUOTE]This is interesting. Yes, I've been a voracious reader since I was a child, but I didn't make that connection. That's got to be part of it; it would be nearly impossible to read a book if it were written like one of Bob's posts.

What's most curious is how he doesn't seem to realize that whatever argument he is making is severely undermined by his refusal to write in grammatical Englsih.

 

So Bob, what is your purpose in being here? Is it just to hassle us? Because you sure don't seem to be a fan of science. You know, I think your credibility would be aided if you could momentarily drop the theistic evolutionist bashing and make a useful contribution to the forum in the form of a new science thread. You may notice I've posted a couple recently (hard to say since you haven't responded to either), and I don't think it would take too long for you to dig up an interesting open access journal article. Then maybe we could find some common ground and have a friendly discussion.

 

In this and all the similar threads, it seems to me that those of us who speak so forcefully about the infallibility of the Bible need to be sure that we have thought through how we mean this. It is putting too heavy a burden on the Bible to insist that it be a modern document, adhering to our standards of reportage. It is a theological document, dealing definitively with who we are and who God is and what our relationship to Him is. It was never intended to be a book of science, and its historiography is a product of its own time and culture. That is not to say that our own scientific method and historiography are absolute; they too are conditioned by the values and limits of our time.

You can certainly believe in an all-powerful God without assuming that those who experienced Him and recorded their experiences did so in a way that was couched in a method of reporting that was developed hundreds of years after their time.

To make the point succinct -- we do not read Genesis 1-11 as literal history or science, but as metahistory, a wonderful insight into the heart and intention of God as well as into the depravity and possibility in the heart of humankind. It alludes to historical realities without having to bear the burden of reporting them just as The New York Times might do so today. But that does not mean it is "untrue". It means that it is universally true, in the deeper sense of the term -- existentially true, true for all humanity.

 

So you don't really have any interest in science? Pity. So why are you posting in this forum if you aren't planning on posting anything about science?

 

No, it's only been obvious that you want to hassle theistic evolutionists and picked this location because many of us post here.

Not about science. Belongs in a different forum. Displays heavy bias and disrespect for others.

Well, we have no common ground there because you're in your own alternate reality on this as UTEOTW and Paul have demonstrated.

Oh yes, I see definite impartiality here. Once again, not about science. Doesn't belong in any forum as it's just a lame attempt to pick a fight.

So in other words, you're trolling?

Don't feed the trolls.

Bob, the reason I don't respond to any of your threads with any seriousness (besides the fact that reading your writing gives me a headache) is because I take you about as seriously as . . . let's see, a preying mantis nymph. You seriously have zero credibility in my eyes. One easy way to improve this would be to make an attempt to discuss actual science instead of running around yapping "Atheist! Liar!" like an annoying little terrier that needs to be punted into next week. It would be easy--I'm sure you could find some scientific topic noncontroversial enough that we could discuss it without arguing, perhaps something in chemistry or physics. However, I know you're not going to do that because you've displayed little interest in or knowledge about science. So I will continue to ignore your ranting.