Neither would I. However, if there had only been one no-hitter ever thrown in the history of baseball, and it was preceded by God saying there would be this no-hitter thrown by this pitcher, and followed by God saying there would never again be a no-hitter thrown by any pitcher, and no one had ever seen or heard of a no-hitter by any pitcher in the thousands of years that followed, then I might think it was fair to call that no-hitter supernatural.
My understanding is that the YEC folks seek to integrate the supernatural (the Bible) and the natural (what science studies). Whether they would call their arguments for the flood “naturalistic,” you would have to take up with them. My point is that since science focuses on studying natural processes (methodological naturalism), I don’t see how you can claim that it should be able to discover or predict a supernatural event.
No, to use your words, you gave me your interpretation of the Bible. It’s unfair of you to call your interpretations of the Bible “biblical testimony,” but call others’ interpretations of the Bible “their interpretations of the Bible.”
As I’ve said, this is a false dichotomy, and it’s the way flat-earthers talk. “If the earth is not still, then God has deceived us.”
No, I gave you actual Biblical testimony. What the text says is indisputable. It’s so indisputable that thousands of commentators have agreed about what it appears to be saying. Consequently, thousands of commentators have interpreted it in various ways to try and reconcile it with a young earth or young creation of humans while contradicting the scientific evidence, while other commentators have interpreted it differently, and consequently had no conflict with science at all.
You need to explain why it is a false dichotomy to say that God left a pile of evidence that says He did not create the earth supernaturally in only six days. Why is it a false dichotomy to say this? What flat earthers say is a false dichotomy because there’s an actual false dilemma in their statement. In my statement there is no dilemma; there’s no dichotomy at all, false or otherwise.
You label your view as indisputable in the first three sentences and then describe the dispute over it in the fourth. You should forgive a reader if he is confused.
I’ve explained it repeatedly and in various ways. Once again: since science excludes the study of supernatural processes why do you claim that you’d scientifically know what results a supernatural process would leave? Once again again: “God left a pile of evidence” is your characterization of what you’ve seen, not God’s. Once again again again: If God has told you, in effect, to disregard what you think the scientific evidence is telling you (a la the words engraved on the convex automobile mirror) how can you claim He’s deceived you?
No I don’t. I didn’t say there’s a dispute over the verses. I said people agree with what it appears to be saying, and consequently interpret to indicate either X or Y. Both agree that these verses appear to be saying that there were already other humans in existence before Adam and Eve. This doesn’t agree with the view of creation which people like you have, so you say “Well we can’t interpret these passages of Genesis literally, what they’re really saying is God approved of incest, and that Cain’s sister was happy to marry a fraticidal brother”. It’s the same way that YECs red-pen Genesis 1, marking up all the parts of the chapter which they say should be interpreted non-literally.
Well this is getting away from the dichotomy question (which I suppose will remain unanswered), but again this has been replied to many times. We’re not talking about how we know scientifically what results a supernatural process would leave. We’re talking about the fact that we know, scientifically, what results a natural process would leave (including a natural process initiated by God, as in this case). We know this from repeated experimentation. So we know what results a natural process would leave. They’re exactly the results we see today. So the burden of evidence is on you to demonstrate that a supernatural process would leave exactly the same results as a natural process.
Not at all, God Himself tells us that the natural creation is a reliable witness to His handiwork. It’s in the Bible!
But He hasn’t done this at all. Do you really think that He has said that we should disregard the scientific evidence?
[quote=“Mike_Gantt, post:456, topic:36256”]
I am, for all practical purposes, scientifically illiterate. I’m not hear to discuss or learn science.[/quote]
I see a huge inconsistency between those two statements.
[quote] I take your word for it that the scientific evidence strongly points you to an old earth.
[/quote] I’m not seeing that you do. And yet again, it’s not the passive, retrospective inference as you describe it. It’s predictions about what we will directly observe that make it so convincing, and where YEC pseudoscience falls apart.
I could understand this if we were interacting on a science website. However, this is a Christian website. Surely, BioLogos was not started because its supporters thought there wasn’t enough information about science available on the web.
BioLogos invites the church and the world to see the harmony between science and biblical faith as we present an evolutionary understanding of God’s creation.
And how do you explain your repeated claims about the nature of science as mere retrospective examination of evidence?
