How can we convince Creationists who 'do' take the Bible's cosmology at face value

Faith & Science Conversation
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We often like to show Young Earth Creationists that the Bible assumes a prescientific cosmology, with a flat earth held up by pillars covered by a solid firmament with water above it, in order to show that the Bible is not to be read as an accurate science textbook. Unfortunately, in the post truth era in which we live in, there are those who ‘do’ believe in this cosmology, crazy as it may seem:


This next guy has the right idea so far as scripture is concerned, but otherwise…

And this is just plain (or ‘plane’) crazy:

Is there any way of changing these people’s mind?

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I really wouldn’t bother. You’re always going to get nutters out there coming out with all sorts of crazy crackpottery like that.

The time to start getting concerned is when sufficiently large numbers of people start taking their wingnuttery seriously enough that it starts to cause problems. Like when it’s causing divisions in the church for example.

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I meant for this post to be somewhat lighthearted

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Yeah, you have to laugh sometimes. The world would be a dull and boring place without the likes of Gene Ray and Ken Ham.

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Once you go flat, you never go back

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I mostly just leave them alone or don’t bring it up. They might be right, they might be wrong.

1 Tim 1:3-4 “As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain people not to teach false doctrines any longer 4 or to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. Such things promote controversial speculations rather than advancing God’s work—which is by faith.”

They don’t really bother me that much, let them think what they want. What more annoys me is AIG and the like. That website and the creation museum…How much money was spent there that could have been share God’s love and given to feed the hungry or to help missionaries who are spreading the gospel!

I am not saying twist scriptures to reach the world at all. But if you have an interpretation of anything that can be backed up by other verses and logic and it happens to allow others who had a block and couldn’t believe in God because of “x”, and you give the a reasonable explanation of x. that is good.

Where as all AIG does is alienate all atheists or scientist, turn them away from God/Christianity, and ‘preach to the choir’. All they do is re-enforce what many already believe, who believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible. No one is coming to know God through their work, it is turning people away form God! They make me sick!

There is little you can do for them other than pray for them. They are devoted to the cult of pride and it is more important for their AIG narrative to be correct than for others to come to know God.

But if they aren’t from the AIG cult, you can tell them that Gen 1:16 speaks God making 2 great lights, one light to rule the day (sun), and a light to rule the night (moon). And we know the moon isn’t a light, rather a reflection of the sun. God wasn’t lying, He created the sun and the moon, just like God causes it to rain. Just because we can explain the natural process of how something works, doesn’t mean God didn’t make it work.

I would try to explain to them how there is no accurate scientific, biologic, or cosmological claim in the Bible, because it wasn’t a book about accuracy of those things, it was a book of purpose, meaning, function, order, rule.

It also says to follow God with your heart or mind. The word mind I have heard can be translated to gut, like the saying “gut feeling”. They didn’t know where the mind was nor our thoughts come from our brains. We know now our brains and minds are in our heads. The Bible isn’t wrong, it was written to a people who thought that.

Or perhaps you could have them attempt to explain the current scientifically known/observed cosmos to people back then, and show how pointless/impossible that would be.

Imagine trying to explain such a ‘complex’ thing as the universe as we know it. How there is gravity, and an atmosphere, molecules that we can’t see, body parts that have known functions. The book would be huge! And then talk about translation errors to other languages that didn’t have words like phenome and genome.

Did God say man does not live on bread alone, but by the knowledge of how the universe works? Did Jesus amaze those in the temple of His cosmological and biological understandings? Man lives by the love/faith/trust in God, and Jesus amazed them by the authority for which He spoke about the purpose and function of God and man.

Could you get a 5 year old to steal a candy bar? Or for a 5 year old that wanted to steal one not to? Would you use words like penal system, United States Constitution, rule of law, justice system, statutes and legal jargon? Or would you perhaps use ‘non-legal’ terms that got your point across? Would that mean you don’t know the legal system?

Or have them read Psalms 104, a known/non-argued poetic book that mirrors the Gen account.

But I did enjoy that 3rd video.
It reminded me of this video…

Or any X is “Illuminati” video

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This may sound silly, but how do we debunk flat earthers who believe space images are CGI. I’ve heard that images from space ‘are’ in fact digitally enhanced?

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@Reggie_O_Donoghue

“Digitally enhanced” covers a pretty broad range. Someone might use that phrase to mean they “inserted an image of Santa Claus on a Mars dune”.

Or, it might mean “converting a black and white raw image into a range of colors” because the black and white raw image is sensing heat, or gravity, or height - - whatever the technology is for that particular study.

Or, it might mean something that impressed the heck out of me! Pictures from Mars tend to be veiled in an orange/pink “haze” due to the normal color of the Martian soil. NASA figured out a way to filter out the specific frequency ranges that this “haze” reflects at. Once they did that, the blues of thick glacier layers of pure water were immediately easier to find and analyze. If you were there on Mars in person, you would still be coping with the Martian haze. In other words, sometimes “digitally enhanced” means having “Superman’s Eyes”!

image

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Someone who is that stubborn, may not be able to be convinced. If you took them into space to see for themselves, they would say you put them in a sim with a projection window and scammed them. To come up with that above video, takes massive determination and stubbornness.

I wouldn’t even say close mindedness. It isn’t like they hurry their heads and ignore facts/arguments. They instead, one up with a theory that explains your facts/arguments in their way.

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I have heard that the earth from space naturally looks like the colour of the blue sky, that may explain why they digitally alter it.

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@Reggie_O_Donoghue

I don’t understand your reasoning. What is the “it” to which you refer?

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The image of earth from space

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If the Earth is naturally blue from space… why would there be any adjustments?

Would you like to start your whole question over? Several days ago I was discussing digitally enhancing the images from Mars.

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One of my favorite pics, taken from a million or so miles away. I like it because it shows the relative size of the moon and earth, as well as accurately shows the blandness of the moon compared to the blue of earth.

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You don’t. You quote Matthew 7:6 to yourself and find a more worthwhile audience in which to invest your time and insights. :slight_smile: And people knew the earth was spherical long before pictures from space existed.

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Matthew 7:6 Give not that which is holy to the dogs

As a dog fancier I find that offensive. :wink:

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Well, I had in mind the pearls before swine part, no offense to canines intended.

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As a pig fancier I find that offensive. :wink:

Haha, sorry, I couldn’t resist!

(And I very much agree with your sentiment!)

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I was a young earth creationist, but I listen to Hugh Ross and Aron Rah. I then realized that my view of the Genesis account was being challenged in a legidement way. Don’t write-off YECs.

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Welcome to our little corner of cyberspace, Tomcat. It is good to have you here and to hear your voice. You bring up a good point, that despite our differences in interpretation of a bit of scripture, we are all brothers and sisters, and bound in love.
Like all I know here, I have dear friends who hold to YEC or RTB or ID interpretation, and I do not doubt their sincerity. My main problem is that some of the leadership of some of the organizations appear to not have a like attitude, and it affects all of us in the impediment of Christian fellowship, and also drives some away from the truth of the gospel.
In any case, we hope you enjoy the conversation here, and look forward to knowing you better.

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