I was talking to a man at our church who is YEC, as well having some strong political leanings, who in the course of conversation dropped something straight out of conspiracy land that he took as being fact. I realized that he no doubt was fed a steady diet of that sort of thing through the websites and news sources he trusted until the bizarre became normalized. It is a real concern.
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Have scientists become radical activists? Perhaps that explains some of the lack of trust.
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The statement you copied is not an example of radical activism, itâs an example of enforcing professional standards. Discuss culture war grievances elsewhere, this forum is not the place for it and itâs off-topic to the discussion.
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I like your assessment of this as âgroomingâ because so much YEC content is focused on children. In my opinion the only way to keep people believing in YEC is to get them when theyâre children, because adults wonât listen.
I donât think Iâve ever seen a ministry devoted exclusively to convincing adults of YEC, but if anyone would like to link to one I would be very amused.
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Interesting article linking Marxism to conspiracy theories:
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I donât have anything original to say, but here are a few thoughts.
Yes, the belief in this world in conspiracy theories is quite disturbing - enough to keep one awake at night. The thing is that arguing with people in a sense reinforces the belief in a conspiracy theory because it supports the âonly my group has the answersâ attitude. So, I pick my battles very carefully, but mostly pray. Others may be more vocal about challenging conspiracy theories, but that is not my gift.
What helps me sleep at night is faith that God is sovereign. Jesus called me to believe in Him and to trust Him, not to change people to think like me. That of course leads to action, and if some little thing that I do points others to trust Jesus, then great.
One action I very much like is the approach of @Kendel in helping people to learn how to do research and think critically about sources - not telling people what to think, but how to think.
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As Iâve often noted, in my university days the largest numbers of Christian students abandoning the faith were YECers, while I never encountered a single student who became a Christian due to YEC presentations.
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Thanks, @Andy7. I donât think Iâm very successful outside of strict library research. But one can hope.
And pray.
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The algorithms of the search engines help to do it even without the persons realizing what happens. It just seems that the results of searches with Google et al. are mostly supporting the personal beliefs. So it is mainstream in the results they get.
I have also experienced that I was excluded from the âfriendsâ able to read someones social media pages because I questioned her anti-vax beliefs. It is nice to write to an audience that does not question your beliefs.
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The documentary âWe Believe in Dinosaursâ made this point in a rather eerie way, showing clips of Ken Ham reciting âgotchaâ questions he wanted kids to learn (like, âWere you there?â), and then having the group of kids continually repeat them back to him, word for word. And yet itâs others that he accuses of indoctrination.
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The OP comes across as a culture war grievance, as do the constant attacks here against YEC and ID. Other Christians as the target of BioLogos endorsed attacks seems contrary to the goals of BioLogos.
We believe that conversations among Christians about controversial issues of science and faith can and must be conducted with humility, grace, honesty, and compassion as a visible sign of the Spiritâs presence in Christâs body, the Church.
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Noted, but I donât consider myself a culture warrior and donât mind living in a diverse society at all. What I do mind is delusional anti-vaxers running for president so they can enact policies that kill people. I do mind Christians opposing all manner of inititives designed to make us live more sustainably because they believe lies about climate change being an elaborate hoax.
If you feel like âYECâ is constantly attacked, itâs because they promote ideas that are wrong and call them, âbiblical,â and âChristianâ which I believe is something that harms people and Christianity. The goals of BioLogos are to combat this harm. Gracious dialogue involves treating other PEOPLE civilly and respectfully, not treating all ideas as deserving of respect. Some ideas are wrong and bad. Grooming people to swallow conspiracy theories is wrong and bad. Saying so doesnât mean Iâm âattackingâ Ken Ham. And this is a discussion forum where I can express my personal opinions and it does not entail they are âendorsedâ by BioLogos.
Political discussions about abortion, homosexuality, and transgender rights/care arenât allowed on the forum.
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Such as the fraud that was presented to Eve in Genesis chapter 3?
1Now the serpenta was more crafty than any beast of the field that the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, âDid God really say, âYou must not eat from any tree in the garden?â â
2The woman answered the serpent, âWe may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden, 3but about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, God has said, âYou must not eat of it or touch it, or you will die.â â
4âYou will not surely die,â the serpent told her. 5âFor God knows that in the day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.â
6When the woman saw that the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eyes, and that it was desirable for obtaining wisdom, she took the fruit and ate it.
The problem here is that you refuse to accept that Satan can physically interract in and with nature and that he most definately can corrupt it.
The real fraud is that you follow in a secular version of uniformitarianism that is simply not biblical. The bible clearly tells us throughout 66 books, sin has corrupted this world so badly that God is going to destroy it and make anew
Rev 21
1Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth,a for the first heaven and earth had passed away, and the sea was no more
This is in fullfillment of the prophecy alao given in Daniel chapter 2
34As you watched, a stone was cut out,d but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay, and crushed them. 35Then the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold were shattered and became like chaff on the threshing floor in summer. The wind carried them away, and not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that had struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.
Instead of following the bible, this thread attempts to.claim that traditional creationism portrayed by a book that is historically proven to be more than 2500 years old (the bible) is a conspiracy? Sorry but thats an unsound claim for any christian to make. The only way this claim can be supported is to ignore the bible statements that support the traditional 2500 year old viewn(ie genealogies, kings and kingdoms, and the nature of sin)
Despite any science, its impossible to reconcile from secular science study that suffering and death are a direct result of sin and biblicly, were not in this world prior to sin.
The point you must rememberâŚChristianity does not exist because of scienceâŚit exists because of Gods WordâŚthe bible. If you believe in God because you are vhristisn, then you have to believe His word. If it is at odds with science, and you are studying this sinful corrupted world through sinful corrupted eyes, then obviously the secular results are going to be front and centre. Satan has made sure of that.
What christians need to do is listen for that still small voice.
God is not making robots hereâŚeven satan has free choice. God did not prevent the cloning of dolly the sheepâŚhe isnt preventing these kinds of corruptions of our reality, so why do you demand Satan cannot manipulate the physical world around us?
Your 250 years of science is but a drop in the bucket of the 6000 years satan has had to scientifically corruptneverything you seeâŚor do you not think satan has any scientific knowledge and ability? I believe satan knows more about science than humans will ever knowâŚand next to God, he can manipulate and use it in its entirety for his own purposes. He knows science more than any other creation in all of the universe. The only reason he doesnt destroy us with science is because God wont let him go that farâŚbut its the still small voice your science must search for, you will not find the God the Nazerites were searching for (if you recall Jesus being reiected by his home town you will understand this point)
Nope, not like that at all.
Iâm all for being sensitive to the Holy Spirit, but no, the Holy Spirit doesnât do the same kind of work as peer reviewers. If you are evaluating science you should listen to scientists, not God.
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Stupid phoneâŚill fix this
Ok i already answered this aboveâŚill post it again
I believe satan knows more about science than humans will ever knowâŚand next to God, he can manipulate and use it in its entirety for his own purposes. He knows science more than any other creation in all of the universe. The only reason he doesnt destroy us with science is because God wont let him go that farâŚbut its the still small voice your science must search for, you will not find the God the Nazerites were searching for (if you recall Jesus being reiected by his home town you will understand this point)
You are claiming the Holy Spirit is guiding youâŚthat simply.false. i can prove to you, which i have done repeatedly on these forums, that theologically the secular view you follow is wrong and yet you ignore it.
Those who cover their eyes and ears ro biblically consistent science are ignoring the still small voice by instead wilfully chosing to follow the mainstream secular view. You do not believe that satan has the power to manipulate the world around us and that is theolgically incorrect.
So what you must do is separate science and GodâŚyou put them in different baskets in order to justify an unsound theology that ignores biblical statements that are self evident. Thats not how salvation worksâŚthats serving two masters
YECs have two different baskets too, to legitimize falsehoods about Godâs creation.
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That sounds pretty silly to me. Satan isnât omniscient. Where did he learn all this stuff about science? This sounds to me like an even worse fear-based conspiracy theory than the whole âscientists are out to deceive everyone.â Now we are supposed to be afraid Satan is out to destroy the world with science? Thatâs ridiculous and paranoid. No thanks, hard pass.
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This is the endpoint of the YEC conspiracy mindset.
Here I thought âthe devil made the dinosaur fossilsâ was a relic of bygone days.
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Sigh. Here we go againâŚ
No Adam. The fraud that was presented to Eve in Genesis chapter 3 may have been momentous in terms of its effect, but it was minuscule compared to the kind of fraud that scientists would have to be perpetrating if the earth really were six thousand years old and they really were covering it up.
Remember, weâre talking about millions of scientists spending trillions of dollars over the course of more than two hundred years on producing millions of data points giving a history that is detailed, coherent, rigorous, and mathematically precise and on top of that doing so without anyone blowing the whistle on it. Anyone who believes that human beings are capable of perpetrating such a fraud on an industrial scale like that and keeping it quiet for as long as that is quite frankly delusional.
So what are you saying? Are you claiming that Satan went to extraordinary lengths to fabricate vast swathes of detailed, coherent and mathematically precise evidence on an industrial scale for 4.5 billion years of history that never happened?
Itâs another take on the Omphalos Hypothesis, I guess, but where is the Biblical justification for the belief that the devil has that kind of authority? Youâre claiming here that Satan has the authority to create things, and that is something I always thought was a prerogative that belonged to God alone.
No Adam. I follow Deuteronomy 25:13-16, as Iâve said over and over again. Science has rules, honesty has rules and measurement has rules, and the Bible demands that we obey those rulesâin every context, including science. And it is those rules, not any kind of âsecular version of uniformitarianismâ, that tell us in no uncertain terms that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old and not six thousand.
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Dr. Peter Hotez, like Drs. Fauci and Collins (BL founder, of course), is a hero. The three of those men combined have saved literally millions of lives. Dr. Hotez has calculated from actual data that 200,000 people needlessly died from anti-vax propaganda during the height of Covid.
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