Posted by Hemant Mehta in Ray Comfort is the man responsible for the recent distribution of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (with a 50-page introduction explaining why it’s all junk science and how Darwin is connected to Hitler) at college campuses across the country. He distributed the books a day earlier than he said he would. On Tuesday, he announced that his ministry will be giving away a million more copies of the book.
He’s also the man speaking alongside ministry partner Kirk Cameron in the infamous video about “the banana: an atheist’s worst nightmare.”
You asked questions and Ray responded.
A few notes:
- This is uncut. I added in links when appropriate. I also fixed a couple grammatical things, with the goal to preserve the intended meaning at all times.
- All emphases are his.
- I did not ask Ray many questions about Creationism in general, because any Creationist could answer those. I tried to stick to questions which only he could answer.
And with that, here we go:
Hemant Mehta: Why did you distribute the books a day early? Do you think that was deceptive?
Ray Comfort: Whether or not it was “deceptive” depends on your point of view. We originally intended to give the books out on the 19th but because of the threats of book burnings, of “unilateral resistance,” and the many threats to tear out the Introduction, we changed our strategy. I believe it was a strategically good move. Many atheists had planned to disguise themselves as students and collect multiple copies themselves to stop students from getting the books. One atheist benevolently said, “I wish people would stop ragging on him distributing the books early. It’s a good strategic move to try to pre-empt our events, themselves intended to oppose his . . . it’s a legitimate tactic, no matter how frustrating.”
Hemant: Why did the first editions of your book not include four important chapters from Darwin’s book? (They are in the second printing, you have said, but why not the first?)
Ray: When laying out the book for the first print (30,000 copies), the publishers found that it was over 400 pages and a book that size was too expensive to be a free publication. I therefore randomly removed four chapters and Darwin’s Introduction, saying within the book that they could be freely downloaded at www.originextra.com. But for the second print (175,000 copies) we dropped the text-size, and that reduced the entire book to 304 pages, making it affordable as a giveaway. It was the second print that we made available to students.
Hemant: Similarly, why reprint a first edition of Darwin’s book and not the sixth edition (which contained corrections and an additional chapter)?
Ray: I published the first edition because that’s what we were celebrating — 150 years since the publication of the first edition of On the Origin of Species.
Hemant: The arguments you make in the introduction to the Darwin book have been stated before — and refuted repeatedly by scientists. So why repeat them? Are you interested in hearing atheists’ responses to your questions?
Ray: I don’t deny that the arguments I have used have been addressed many times. However, it’s only atheists that believe that they have been “refuted.” I don’t. I listen to arguments and if they don’t hold up, I don’t accept them.
Hemant: In your own words, how would you describe how evolution and natural selection are supposed to work according to the theory that is broadly accepted in the life sciences? (In other words, can you explain what evolution is before trying to debunk it?)
Ray: Someone who believes in the theory of evolution believes that life started simply and over millions of years evolved to the complex state we now see. The process of change is supposedly brought about by something Darwin called “natural selection.” Evolution has no explanation for the genesis of life, and it has never been “observed” to take place. Nor has it been scientifically proven — because it’s never been “tested” in a laboratory. Evolution, as you have conceded in your question, is simply a theory. Darwinian evolution is often confused by believers with a species adapting within its own kind. Transitions within a species (a kind) is not Darwinian evolution.
Hemant: What is the strongest evidence you can think of in support of evolution by natural selection?
Ray: There is no indisputable evidence for species to species evolution. All “evidence” comes down to faith — does the believer believe the dating process or the information given by other believers in evolution. The mantra is that there are millions of fossils that scientifically prove evolution. I am often sent long lists of missing links. But as I investigate each one, they are not true missing links between kinds. There are millions of fossils that reveal adaptation within kinds, but there are no undisputed fossils that show one species (kind) evolving into another species (kind). The links between kinds were missing in Darwin’s day, and 150 years later they are still missing. To date I have seen no evidence for the theory of evolution.
Hemant: What evidence would you need to see in order to accept evolution?
Ray: If you can think of something new that you think is credible, please let me know and I will be happy to consider it.
Hemant: Many atheists say you make a lot of errors when talking about science. If you heard us saying false things about Christianity, odds are you wouldn’t take us very seriously. Why should we take you seriously?
Ray: Many atheists believe that I make a lot of errors when talking about science. Let me correct them just a little. I have made errors about the beliefs of evolutionists. I am told that I am in error by using the phrase “the law of gravity.” If that’s unscientific, I’m not alone. Many scientists also use the phrase. I am told that I believe that the earth is 6,000 years old, when I have said many times I don’t have any idea about the age of the earth. Those who believe it’s 4.5 billion years old have to have faith in radioisotope dating techniques. I don’t have that sort of faith.
Hemant: What are the last few books about evolution which you’ve read (written by people who accept evolution, I mean)?
Ray: Evolution For Dummies (I’m sure some would say that that is an appropriate book for me). As usual, the explanation [as] to why we have 1.4 million kinds with both male and female was ignored. The Wild World of the Future talks about future evolution speculation, as opposed to the usual evolution speculation of past. The last book I read was On the Origin of Species. I read it from cover to cover and found it a difficult read because most of it is pretty boring. I have heard atheists say the same thing. However, thanks to our generous giveaway of a total of 205,000 copies, others can read for themselves what Darwin actually believed, and make up their own minds.
Hemant: The banana. Do you stand by the argument in your video? Do you regret saying what you did? Do you like when people associate that video with you? Was it a joke? Are you aware that the banana in your video is genetically modified while a “natural” banana would be virtually unrecognizable? (There are several other questions regarding the Banana, but these are the overall themes).
Ray: I deeply regret doing the banana routine on television without a live audience. I have been doing it for live audiences for more than 20 years, and it’s never failed to get a lot of laughs.
Regarding genetic modification. There isn’t any evidence that the banana has changed its shape in the last 2,000 years. The anonymous creator of the well-publicized YouTube clip used a picture of a modern banana that was shaped like a potato, to make me look like a fool (and he did a pretty good job). To see evidence that the banana hasn’t changed shape, go to the bottom of http://www.livingwaters.com/origin/presskit and click on the PDF of “The Banana Controversy.”
Humbling though it has been, the subject has worked in my favor. Being “The Banana Man” has left me with a very low bar to reach. People are quite amazed when I’m able to string a complete sentence together.
Hemant: Many countries with high numbers of non-religious people have lower rates of crime, spousal abuse, divorce, etc. Doesn’t this go against the idea that non-theism is dangerous?
Ray: Theism or non-theism isn’t the issue. For example, religion has caused terrible atrocities throughout history (and still does today). It comes in at the number two spot. Number one is atheistic communism, which has been responsible for an estimated 100 million deaths throughout history*. So the problem has little to do with religion or atheism. The root problem is people that use whatever means possible for their own evil agenda. Crime is all over this world, because sin dwells in every person.
[* Footnote: “Communism has been the greatest social engineering experiment we have ever seen. It failed utterly and in doing so it killed over 100,000,000 men, women, and children, not to mention the near 30,000,000 of its subjects that died in its often aggressive wars and the rebellions it provoked.”]
Hemant: You write on your website that “It is impossible for a Christian to convert to atheism because a Christian is someone who knows God.” People have sent me letters talking about how extremely devout and Christian they used to be, even though they are now atheists. What do you make of their testimonies? (Are they liars? Are they not really atheists? Were they never truly Christians?)
Ray: These people are the results of the horrible manipulative practices of modern Christianity. Many of these spurious converts fall away from the faith and (understandably) become very bitter. Some become atheists. Some stay in the church and give God lip-service (they play the hypocrite). If this doesn’t make sense, take the time to listen to the two free audios (“Hell’s Best Kept Secret” and “True and False Conversion”) on www.livingwaters.com. Hopefully they will help to shed light on what has been happening because of the practices of modern Christianity.
Hemant: Can you name some other Christians you believe are doing good work to spread Biblical word? (In other words, what other Christians do you respect and support?) What do you make of Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church? Are their actions and beliefs consistent with the God you believe in?
Ray: There are millions of Christians (and thousands of Christian organizations) that I love and wholeheartedly support.
I know that many atheists will disagree with me when I say that I love atheists. But if I didn’t, I would have paid for the meals of 40 atheists when they invited me to dinner, in Orange County. Why would I give Red Lobster meal vouchers to atheists on my blog? Why did I give away 120 hard cover books to atheists? I don’t hate anybody. I think that the people at Westboro Baptist church are terribly misguided and that they are misrepresenting Christianity.
There has been a lot of talk about Hitler using Christianity for his hate filled agenda. But he perverted the message of Christianity, which says to love your enemies, and to do good to those that hate you. But Hitler spoke about evolution in his autobiography and then used it correctly for his own ends. He took survival of the fittest to its logical conclusion. Richard Dawkins says that evolution is “survival of the fittest,” and that he is thankful that we don’t instigate Darwin’s theory in contemporary society, where we care for the elderly. You can see Dawkin’s saying this in an interview on the Press Kit on www.livingwaters.com
Hemant: When scientists uncover million-year-old fossils or discover evolutionary “missing links,” do you think they are lying to themselves or somehow misinterpreting the data?
Ray: The Theory of Evolution is like a puffy summer cloud. It changes almost daily. It is nebulous, and can be as large or as small as the imaginations of men. I have said many times that its language is the language of speculation — using words like “believe” “suppose,” “probably,” and “perhaps.” Nothing is sure, because “science” is forever changing its position as it searches for truth. Today’s “missing link” is discarded for tomorrow’s, and something that was 300 million [years old] years ago can become 400 million years [old] overnight. So much is based on faith in dating methods and unscientific beliefs of men who have an erroneous presupposition. I don’t have faith in the same things in which evolutions have faith.
Hemant: On your website, you’ve mentioned some nasty things people have been saying about you. But you never link back to the original postings. Is there a reason for this? Wouldn’t it be good practice, so readers could see the context of the quotations for themselves and judge the statements for themselves?
Ray: This question was asked by “Linzee Binzee,” who quoted someone saying that they hated me, and wished that I had a heart attack. Then Linzee said, “Quote-mining is a tactic Comfort is constantly guilty of, and in this instance he used it to defend his pathetic cowardice.” The quote in question was from the comments section of my own blog.
The general rule is that if it is a scientific claim, you will find “Notes” at the bottom of my posts (you can check on this by looking at previous posts). But when people say negative or hateful comments, it has no academic importance and it’s a simple thing to Google and find the source.
Hemant: You spend a lot of time talking to and writing about atheists. Yet, people of other faiths (Muslim, Hindu, etc.) also don’t believe in your god. Surely, they’re facing the same perilous future as the atheists. Why not spend energy on them as well? Why focus solely on the atheists?
Ray: I have preached open air more than 5,000 times. That took a lot of energy. Most of those times I was addressing people outside the atheist community. I have also written 60 or so books, most of them have nothing to do with atheism. If I seem to focus on atheists it’s because they won’t leave me alone. They hang around my blog like bugs at a camp fire, and when I go to give books out at universities, they are waiting for me. But I love and honor them, and count it a privilege to speak with them.
Hemant: Why have Christians like Francis Collins accepted evolution so wholeheartedly?
Ray: I will answer this by quoting from a recent entry on “Atheist Central” (note the “Note” at the end):
A Christian can believe in fairies, if he wishes. While I wouldn’t doubt the salvation of one who did, I may doubt his sanity. This is because Christianity doesn’t come from what you believe (although that is part of the equation), it comes from who you know.
Let me back up a little to explain what I mean. The Bible teaches the Jesus Christ was pre-existent before He was manifest in human form. He claimed to be the source of life, saying things like “I am the life” (see John 1:4, 11:25, 14:6). When someone repents and believes the gospel (that Jesus Christ died for his sin and rose on the third day), he places his trust in the Savior and comes to “know” God. Then God “seals” the believer with the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ “who is our life” dwells within the believer (see John 14:16-18). The Scriptures say “Christ, who is in you” (see Colossians 1:27). Jesus said that he would come to and would actually dwell within the Christian through the Holy Spirit (see John 14:21).
Here now is the bottom line. If you have Jesus Christ, you have life, irrespective of your denomination. God knows those that love Him. If you don’t have Jesus Christ (through the new birth of John 3:3), you don’t have life. You are still dead in your sins and justly under the condemnation of God (see John 3:17-18). Here’s the pivotal verses:
“He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life…”(1 John 5:12-13).
That said, if you have the Son of God, then the Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth (see John 16:13). Your theology in time will become “sound,” and you will align your beliefs with those truths revealed in Holy Scripture, because it is God’s revelation to mankind. If the Old Testament says there was a literal flood (Jesus did also), the Christian cannot believe otherwise. If the Bible says that the earth freely floats in space when “science” of the time said that it didn’t (see Job 26:7), the Christian quickly sides with the Bible.
In the case of evolution, Scripture is very clear that God made man in His image (not as a primate). He made him and all the animal kingdom as male and female (“Evolutionary biology is unable to reveal why animals would abandon asexual reproduction in favor of more costly and inefficient sexual reproduction.” [1]), and He gave them (and every living animal) the ability to reproduce “after their own kind,” and not to evolve in time into other “kinds” or species of animals. We see the truth of all of the above both in the fossil record and in the creation that surrounds us.
In regards to the 1st edition and 6th edition of On the Origin of Species, Dawkins makes reference to it in his latest book, THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH. He always quotes the 1st edition because it’s Charles Darwin’s real words, before he softened it up for the public on later editions.
Sorry, Comfort said a lot of ‘typical’ things that are a lot more interesting to comment on, but I keep focusing on that one point, which was actually the question, not his reply.
I very much appreciate this sort of dialogue. There is far too much shouting and impatience on opposing sides; people giving each other time to put forward their best arguments for others to then consider is far more constructive and persuasive. Well done.
What? He’s really standing by the banana thing?
An interesting look into the mind of Ray Comfort.
The guy is obviously not a moron. He can reason, although he’s used to lower standards of reasoning than those imposed by a scientific kind of thinking. His problem is that for him, as for many believers, faith trump reasons. You don’t need to learn much about science if (in Ken Ham’s words) “human reason” is worthless before “God’s word”. The religious dogma leads you to how you should interprete data, and what data you should consider or not.
But there’s a good side to Ray Comfort, just as there is one to the “hackergate” (the stolen e-mails at CRU). What we learn is that sloppy wording must be banished. Every word that can be read, distorted, misinterpreted, quote-mined by deniers (be them creationists or global coolers) should be chosen, as much as possible, in order to make this kind of abuse impossible, or at least hard. “Survival of the fittest” is old-fashioned speak, not much better than “red in tooth and claw”.
I think that we don’t really, fully know what we think until we’ve had to defend our views against an opponent. Even Ray Comfort can be useful in that regard: he jumps on ambiguities, inaccuracies, bad wordings etc, and obliges us to refine our thought and expression. That’s worth its weight in bananas!
I’m not buying these warm, fuzzy answers by Ray. “I love atheists” my foot! You should see what he says about atheists on his blog. Not a kind word.
In any case, science strives to lead people to the truth, regardless of what the truth may be. Comfort (and those alike) strive to lead people to God, even if God is not the truth. Therefore, every word he says lacks credibility in my eyes.
I often think that Ray Comfort is a “treasure” as far as atheism and evolution is concerned.
His arguments are simple and presented in an accessible way. Equally, simple research and clear thinking can quickly show the errors of his statements.
If this starts someone thinking, then they are on the right path.
It’s clear to me that Ray Comfort is deluded or dishonest. His definition of evolution is ridiculous. He clearly doesn’t know what evolution is and restates misconceptions of evolution over and over even though people have repeatedly told him he is wrong.
WRONG.
Kenneth Miller is a Catholic and he accepts many of the refutations Ray Comfort dismisses.
WRONG.
Evolution has nothing to say about how life began, only how we got all this diversity of life once life began.
The long term e. coli evolutionary experiment has shown evolutionary adaptations in a lab.
Ray has an agenda, an agenda that, based on his actions, is not affected by evidence or reason. I find him to be dishonest.
Another instance of evolution being observed:
“Instant” Evolution Seen in Darwin’s Finches, Study Says
Without even googling or being an expert I came up with an entirely plausible explanation for how sexual reproduction came about and why it is beneficial to a species (and possibly organism).
(I will skip the change from single celled to multi-celled)
Asexual reproduction means that all the recessive genes remain recessive, even though they may be helpful. By splitting it’s own DNA a multi-celled organism can recombine, in multiple offspring, many versions of its own genes. Some offspring will have a combination that is reproductively beneficial and will crowd out those that aren’t. When multiple organisms of this type are close together they may accidentally reproduce with their neighbour rather than their own genes. This would be sexual reproduction and if this was shown to have even the slightest advantage (more combinations of genes would lead to a greater chance of one being hugely beneficial) natural selection would accellerate this process and make it become the norm.
Ray seems fixated on animal sex, but what about plants? Most wind pollinated plants can easily fertilise themselves but they leave themselves open to cross pollination from other plants. There must be (and obviously is) an evolutionary reason for that otherwise it’d stick to self pollination. Also, aphids can asexually reproduce, one of the few animals that can, yet they choose to reproduce sexually whenever possible (Ray would explain that away by lust which is why I stuck to plants.)
These may or may not be true – but if I can come up with them off the top of my head surely Ray and his people could work out how sex might be an advantage.
He’s still going on about the asexual reproduction thing? His ego is unbelievable – how can somebody who thinks they’re learned be so ignorant?
Here’s the thing, Ray. You may not like this but, they are laughing AT you, not with you.
Ray quotes 1 John 5:12-13. Infinite reward for a finitely held belief. Not just.
Ray talks about God creating man in His own image… and that man reproduces sexually. I wonder who Ray thinks God’s daddy is?
He is one fast-talking huckster, I’ll give him that. He has a talent for evasion and twisting arguments to suit his needs. He would have made a good politician.
Is asexual reproduction among some “kinds” the work of the Devil?
Reading his responses left me with a question I wish I’d asked: What is the definition of a “created kind”? It isn’t species obviously as speciation is dismissed as being “within a kind”. So… what’s a “kind”?
That’s an answer we’ll never get. People with weak arguments tend not to like being pinned down.
Book burnings? Can’t agree with that. Why spoil a good fire.
I see this, and I note that my question was not included in the interview. I would like to know why.
Funny, I find myself getting a lot angrier when I see him misrepresenting science than when I see him discussing religion. I guess it’s because I’m a scientist and seeing someone work so hard to lead people away from demonstrated facts in favor of delusional fantasies makes me want to scream.
His short answer to his understanding of evolution has a remarkably large number of errors, misrepresentations and lies. He includes abiogenesis in half the answer despite the fact that I’ve personally seen it explained to him that abiogenesis and evolution are different things. This shows me that he is unable to define what evolution is rather than what it isn’t and more importantly it shows me that he is not simply deluded, he is dishonest. The fact that evolution does not explain abiogenesis (nor does it pretend to) has been explained to him, so the fact he brings it up as a weakness shows he is deceptive. Who would Jesus lie to, Ray?
He also does the ridiculous “it’s just a theory” schtick that has ALSO been explained to him time and time again, so it is ALSO a lie. Pity my question regarding the scientific method and terminology didn’t make the cut.
Finally, this stupidity about evolution “within kinds”. It’s a common creationist tactic. Since it is too much to believe (even for fundies) that God made, not only every species, but every breed of every animal (separate creations of Bulldogs and Golden Retrievers), especially since many varieties are recorded as having been engineered by man, they try to squeeze out of it saying that variation within species is possible, but change into a new species is not. This is also how they try to get out of the thousands of transitional fossils. The whole problem is of course that there is no magical “line” to cross. What constitutes different varieties and different species is a matter of degrees. In fact we can observe that sometimes Variety A can crossbreed with Variety B, and B with Variety C, but A and C can’t, making them different species. Speciation has been observed during the span of modern science and this barrier of “kinds” only exists within the minds of creationists.
Every argument, every single one, has been patiently and repeatedly explained to Ray. So he is either psychotic and lacks the ability to distinguish reality from fiction, or (more likely) he is a dishonest worm who in pursuit of his religious ideology is perfectly willing to lie and decieve.
Wrong place to do it Ray. We’ve all seen your lies before. You will convince no one here.
He’s a boob.
I’m not sure how beneficial this was for this community. I think it will help Comfort immensely. He will quote from this interview (as he held his own with little challenge) to show how reasonable his point of view really is.
Hemant: What evidence would you need to see in order to accept evolution?
Ray: If you can think of something new that you think is credible, please let me know and I will be happy to consider it.
Yet, there was no follow up comment or factual information from the questioner. There are many more places where he was let off the hook. No comment comes across as “Good point. I think you may be right.”
I’m sorry, but I don’t think these Larry King-style interviews are of value, except to the interviewee.
I’m not buying his whole, “I love atheists!” thing. It reminds me of when a blatant racist exclaims that he is not racist because he has black friends.
Just because you give food away to someone doesn’t mean you love them. I fully expect my family to buy their own food, but it doesn’t mean I hate them, but to go along with more of Ray’s idea of “love,” I once bought a bottle of water for a guy who had just hit my sister’s car. I didn’t like him, but the situation was stressful for everyone, and the water helped in calming things down.
You get someone something, and they’re more likely to be grateful and nice back. It doesn’t sound like he loves atheists; it sounds like he’s just trying to kill some with kindness. Perhaps atheists will just leave him alone, and will stop hanging around his blog “like bugs at a camp fire” if he gives them food.
I have listened to Ray for a while now and listened to all of the scientific community explain to him why his positions are incorrect based on the scientific reasons. This particuar quote happens to disturb me more than most.
To me, he is saying that all the advances that science has made comes down to “faith” in their method of development. Is he willing to apply this to other types of science? Are the medications and medical procedures that I am sure he has taken advantage of just a matter of “faith”. Does he believe in the scientific method when it comes to this aspect of science but not when that same method is applied to evolution? To me, the willingness to ignore the facts or disregard them when it does not suit their needs is what scares me about the religious community.
I doubt if it were his objective to convince anyone here. I suppose rather, that he intended to demonstrate that he could respond to interview questions from a hostile inquisitor with a degree of grace.
It would be interesting to see how he portrays this event on his own site… but not interesting enough for me to go looking for it.
Sorry, Hemant, I only made it halfway through before the horseshit overwhelmed me. The old atheism kills hundreds of millions argument never ceases to drive me wild.
I’m going to go punch things.
Haha I got a mention
What a disappointment, he didn’t say anything new. He really sticks to his talking points. Did anyone see the segment on TMZ about this the other day? Hilarious, Kirk Cameron was trying to rattle off the talking points that I assume have been spoon-fed to him by Comfort and it was just sad to watch.
He doesn’t even listen to corrections that wouldn’t force him to change his beliefs. He repeatedly talks about abiogenesis, give it up already! It’s not evolution, he has to know this by now.
And he still doesn’t get it that the fact that evolution changes with new information is a strength, not a weakness.
I actually hadn’t heard him say that the banana routine was a comedy act that he does in live shows before, but it’s not that that makes me set my expectations low with him, it’s his blatant lies about science and evolution.
so atheists do buzz around his site like bees?
I have never been to his site.
oh well
Ehh. It was really difficult to continue reading after he (once again and not surprisingly) was completely wrong about what evolution is and, more importantly, what I “believe” it is.
Ray: evolution is change in allele frequency over time, at the most basic. Given time, this, by natural selection, sexual selection, and kin selection, genetic drift (as well as potential yet undiscovered mechanisms), can account for the diversity in life we see. Evolutionary theory does not cover the origin of life. It is completely possible that some intelligent being (or God) got life started. The evidence we have (which is not part of evolutionary biology) does not point that way, but if you could give evidence (scientifically testable) of this and you could make your hypothesis falsifiable, and you could use that hypothesis to make predictions about what we should find in nature, I’d be fine with it being called science. It’s not about wanting god(s) out of the picture, it’s about needing what you give us to be scientifically rigorous.
I do find it strange that you’re denying speciation (and that we’ve neither observed it nor tested it in a lab: we didn’t just make it up!). I assume you believe the ark story, and I see you’re equating “kind” with “species”. Noah put more than 1,000,000 species of animals in the ark?
In science, a theory is “a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena” (Princeton WordNet). It is not conjecture or speculation. Evolutionary theory is not remotely “just” a theory.
Just, start over. Learn what evolutionary theory actually says, and why it says that, and then we might be able to actually get somewhere.
Mr. Comfort, what you’ve just said are some of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent responses were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this blog is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may the Flying Spaghetti Monster have mercy on your soul.
“Hitler perverted Christianity, but he got evolution right.”
Boo-hoo, Ray. Like we really expect an evolution-denying Christian to have enough knowledge on the subject to know what would constitute a “perversion.”
Nowhere in the theory of evolution does it say that members within a species must kill other members within the same species to survive. In fact, the entire human race has survived because “fitness,” for humans, includes members of the species cooperating with other members of their species for mutual benefit.
But Comfort will never understand that, because he doesn’t have enough “faith” (read: time to actually do research.)
[...] You can read the interview here. [...]
what pissed me off most was his total flop evasion of the “what would it take” question.
So does Ray side with science or the bible when the bible says that Noah fit all the animal species in the world on a boat that’s smaller than the Titanic? I also love how he says he loves atheists but turns around and calls atheists bugs. Comfort loves atheists in the same way an antisemetic loves Jews that they think are bugs. And I also love how he tries to dodge the question whether or not he thinks Francis Collins is going to hell for believing in evolution and he compares accepting evolution to believing in fairies yet it’s rational to believe in Noah’s ark?
Thanks Hemant for doing this.
Steve called attention to this quote from Ray:
I think this statement ends all meaningful discussion. Though I suppose it still might be useful to talk to him – just to see how such a belief leads someone to think.
Thanks for asking my question and the one about what would be needed for Comfort to accept evolution, Hemant. This was a good idea, even if it’s made only me all the more convinced that Comfort should be allowed to simply fall off the radar.
I hope someone asks him what the difference between abiogenesis and evolution is, sometime soon. That way he can be pinned down as either a liar or self-delusional.
Ray: I don’t deny that the arguments I have used have been addressed many times. However, it’s only atheists that believe that they have been “refuted.” I don’t. I listen to arguments and if they don’t hold up, I don’t accept them.
Priceless. Your standard for determining if they hold up appears to be ‘what I accept’.
Evolution has no explanation for the genesis of life, and it has never been “observed” to take place.
Therefore life doesn’t exist? What are you trying to say here, Ray? That neither abiogenesis, nor design, nor magical creation are credible ideas, since none of them have been observed?
There are millions of fossils that reveal adaptation within kinds, but there are no undisputed fossils that show one species (kind) evolving into another species (kind).
What, Ray, species or kind? In one statement you state that people confuse the two, the next statement you appear to say they’re equatable. Apparently you are quite confused about basic definitions that should be clear to someone who confidently makes claims about disputes in science.
The species definition is not always the same for all clades and families in biology, because different animals reproduce differently, on vastly differently scales of time, quantity and method. I’ve seen various attempts at defining the term ‘kind’, and every one fails with regard to some group of animals. But where biology honestly states that the definition can break down in some cases, ‘baraminologists’ insist that their pseudoscience is useful and exact because the dogma says it must be.
Then you ignore the stupendous problem of hyper-evolution that the idea of adaptation within kinds within about 6,000 years raises. At the same time, young earth creationists declare that billions of years are not enough time to produce the complexity we find. Make up your minds, will ya. The very notion of having a scientific discussion is ridiculous when one side’s arguments effectively refute themselves before even addressing anything but straw man version of the opposition.
Ray: If you can think of something new that you think is credible, please let me know and I will be happy to consider it.
In other words, you have no idea how to begin criticizing science, instead relying on your conviction to reject anything that doesn’t fit your uneducated idea of what science should be.
Those who believe it’s 4.5 billion years old have to have faith in radioisotope dating techniques. I don’t have that sort of faith.
There you go again Ray. You simply ignore that radiometric dating is deemed accurate enough because different isotopes that have different half-lives independently of each other yield compatible results. If you think that takes any amount of unreliable faith, by the same standard you must doubt that tasting and smelling a piece of roast turkey are enough to trust that you’re not eating a rock.
Instead you base your disbelief upon completely untestable claims written down by men who knew even less about reality than you do.
Recollecting which books on evolution you read last, you criticize that a claim that evolution does not make is not addressed. Why Ray, why does the Bible not tell us why Moses always wore pink clothes? Until any apologist or theologian explains that to me, I have no reason to trust Christianity. Apparently you deliberately choose to inform yourself about science by reading open-heartedly speculative fiction, partially outdated and comparatively incomplete material, and when you do find plausibility, you shrug it off by demanding explanations for nonsense you made up yourself. Ray, you’re a walking talking monument of intellectual dishonesty. You do not approach science in good faith.
Regarding your account of the victim toll of Communism, you have not accounted for the technology gap between the 1920s-1950s and the time of, for example, the 17th century when the Thirty Years War raged in Europe, killing between a third and two-thirds of the population. Putting those two examples on a technological level would elevate the religious intra-Christian warfare, pillaging, raping, torturing and executing very far above Stalin’s atrocities. Just something that needs to be pointed out occasionally, not disputing your absolute numbers.
Ray, I think you could do a great good if you challenged the Westboro people directly. They claim to know the Bible in all intricacies better than anyone else, and they have made more than a few theologians and apologists who took them on look pretty bad. If you really want to have people embrace Christ in a warm light and with open arms, it’s people like the ‘Boros who shove themselves in between and paint Christianity in the ugliest tones possible. If you managed to discredit them into shame and repentance, you’d have done a huge service to your Lord, making a clear path to Christ without coercing anyone. He could be working through you.
No, Hitler did not understand or apply Darwin’s theory correctly – he had Darwin’s and any other Darwinian evolutionary science literature banned and burned. He is a prime example of why teaching children about evolution correctly is important. If a creationist developed a mean streak and wanted to vent his hate against a group of people he’d singled out for all wrongs done unto him, his skewed understanding of evolution would be a perfect instruction manual. Hitler was a creationist, which he stated explicitly in Mein Kampf, even reasoning about how life reproduces within kinds. Survival of the fittest is simply a description of what happens in unguided natural competition, not a prescription for intelligent planning. It does not mean breeding of the strongest. It does not mean killing off your own species for the short-term benefit of a deluded elite. The methods of selective breeding and culling have been known for millenia before Hitler. Claiming that Hitler used evolutionary principles is just a way of poisoning the well, of mixing multiple fallacies to slander an entire scientific discipline.
[Atheists] hang around my blog like bugs at a camp fire…
A cute picture, Ray. However, it would be more accurate to use the simile of ‘cleaning personnel at an overturned manure truck’.
*note: I’ll submit this comment to Ray’s blog in two parts because of it’s length
I appreciate this interview because it reminds me of what I was taught as a child studying Christianity.
I appreciate the commenters because I have very little knowledge of evolution and could barely hold my own with a determined Christian such as Mr Comfort. I’m glad so many people do not find biology to be mind-numbingly tedious (with sides of gross!) like I do.
Well, Ray couldn’t answer my question, can he explain how evolution and natural selection work according to the theory.
He said that evolution and natural selection is supposed to work by living things evolving through something Darwin called natural selection.
Thank you Ray, very illuminating.
I suppose that you’d explain the process of erosion as “things eroding.”
Thank you for proving that you can repeat words like a parrot without understanding them. I don’t know why I expected better. You clearly have no idea what you are talking about.
Any conversation with you is a complete waste of time.
I was mostly just frustrated that Hemant didn’t follow up on some of Ray’s answers… Ray got off the hook far too easily here and he WILL use this interview to show that he can handle all the tough questions “atheists” ask him with grace.
Interesting interview, and good questions. Thanks.
Comfort has made me aware of a fact I never before realized: there are people in this world who want answers handed to them, whole and polished. These people regard the work of inquiry and investigation as unnecessary and demeaning, and will do anything to defend their right to avoid it. And they vote. I’m moving to Scotland. Give the colonies back to the Puritans, I can’t stand it here anymore.
What I’ve already seen/read about includes molecular evidence, which is the most convincing for me personally, and the fossil evidence. There are plenty of other reasons, but those clinch it for me.
For what it’s worth, this interview was conducted via email and I sent Ray all the questions at once. There wasn’t an opportunity to follow-up.
Between this site, Facebook, Twitter, and my email inbox, there were a *lot* of questions sent to me. I couldn’t get to them all, so I tried to stick to the major ones or the ones which were asked repeatedly. I also tried to stay away from questions Creationists typically get and focused on ones which only Ray could answer. Sorry if I couldn’t get to yours!
Slummin’ it, are we, Hemant?
The Theory of EvolutionGod is like a puffy summer cloud. It changes almost daily. It is nebulous, and can be as large or as small as the imaginations of men. I have said many times that its language is the language of speculation — using words like “believe” “suppose,” “probably,” and “perhaps.” Nothing is sure, because“science”“theology” is forever changing its position as itsearches for truthscrambles to cobble together ever-greater contrivances and absurdities in effort to preserve its existence amid perpetually shrinking gaps in human understanding. Today’s“missing link”fabricated nonsense is discarded for tomorrow’s, and something that was300 millionbillions of [years old] years ago can become400 million6,000 years [old] overnight.So muchEverything is based on faith indating methods andunscientific beliefs of men who have an erroneous presupposition and an affinity for preposterous fairy tails. I don’t have faith in the same things in whichevolutionsChristians have faith.FTFY.
You can lead a Ray Comfort to science, but you can’t make him think. (You can’t make him not be a douche, either. Seriously)
Well, if nothing else, this confirmed for me that Ray isn’t just a moron. Certainly he’s dumb, but he’s dumb like a fox, coming across as much more intelligent here than in anything else I’ve ever heard or read from him.
Which confirms my second point, that he is willfully dishonest. It’s not that he doesn’t understand what he’s doing is wrong (i.e., quote-mining, misrepresenting science, misrepresenting atheist views), it’s that he doesn’t care. And he knows his audience won’t care either.
That, of course, should have been tales, and, in case it wasn’t clear, it was Ray’s text I edited.
(Where’s the 5-min edit option?)
Hemant wrote: “For what it’s worth, this interview was conducted via email and I sent Ray all the questions at once. There wasn’t an opportunity to follow-up.”
That’s kinda what I figured…. what a shame though. I guess you take what you can get though eh??
@Joffan LMAO, yeah, that about sums it up.
The interview was useful though, for illuminating two points.
1. For the fundamentalist, the fact that science is a dynamic body of knowledge is considered a weakness, not a strength.
For Ray, the fact that science is self-correcting, and that in science you must be willing to discard a faulty (or simply less good) explanation if another comes around that better explains existing data, this core of scientific thought, this is bad! This attacks the core of scientific thinking, the central pillar that has given us every modern convenience and medical advancement we see today. To him, truths must be Eternal and immune to new contradicting data.
2. He his not just ignorant, he is dishonest. The arguments he gives have not only been refuted to him many times, he says things that I have personally seen him be corrected on. He says we’ve never seen speciation, and I’ve SEEN someone give him examples of them. He talks about abiogenesis and I’ve SEEN it explained that it is different from evolution. He talks about it being speculation and “just a theory” and I’ve SEEN the scientific meaning of theory explained to him.
Simply put, it is no longer even slightly possible to think that he believes the things he is saying, or that he says them out of mere ignorance. Many of them he KNOWS are false as they are coming out of his mouth. He is a liar and a snake, and if he feels no shame in lying to people in pursuit of his fundamentalist goals, he has no conscious.
@Roy Natian,
In your example of the finches you perpetrated one of the Top Ten Myths About Creation. Check it out:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/get-answers/top-ten/myths-about-creation
By the way, I think Ray Comfort uses the word species wrong. However what he is saying is true. Animals reproduce after their own KIND!
I think even you believe that evolution has limits, right? Is there a limit to the diversity of the animals that can evolve from say a bull and a cow? Or are the possibilities limitless eg can a bull and a cow evolve into a parakeet? No, right? There are limits. This is what the Bible says and Christians believe. That adaptation has limits. The limit is a the kind level.
God bless you,
Adiel
Adiel, please give a scientific definition of the word “kind”. Is it distinct from species or is the same exact concept?
While you’re at it explain the mechanism by which species can vary while remaining within the same species but never become another species? Where is that limit placed and what is it’s mechanism, according to creationists?
Roughly speaking I believe that kind is more analogous to the family biological classification, but not exactly. I refer to the link I posted above for detail information.
Hey I have a question for you, do you believe that adaptation to an environment can result in limitless diversity? As I asked in my first post, if we were to leave a bull and a cow on an earthlike planet for 4 billion years. Do you think that the descendants of those cows can be as diverse as the life on earth is eg mosquitoes, parakeets, orangutans, octopus, apple trees, and scientists? Or are there limits to what can result from the adaptation of cattles to their environment?
Bible believing Christians believe that there are limits to what can adapt from cattle. The Bible says that they will ultimately reproduce according to their own “kind”.
What do you believe? Limitless or limited adaptation?
Adiel
One of the biggest things creationists miss is the concept of TIME. If they can’t see evolution, it can’t exist. (Gee, turn that around and replace evolution with ‘god’ and watch their heads spin.)
They just don’t seem to get geological time.
Adiel wrote: “Roughly speaking I believe that kind is more analogous to the family biological classification, but not exactly. I refer to the link I posted above for detail information.”
So you don’t know. The link you provided doesn’t give the definition either, and certainly doesn’t give any “detail information”.
Why would you think that would be sufficient? Why on earth would anyone take your rebuttal seriously when YOU can’t even define the words you’re using? I’m not surprised – I’ve never seen/heard a creationist define these vague terms they use to confuse the gullible.
Come back to us when you can define “kind”…
Do you agree that whatever “according to its kind” means it must bean something? Does not “according to its kind” include whatever is “according to its kind” and exclude whatever is not “according to its kind”? I think its silly to say, “Since we are not sure what exactly is modern biological classification of the ancient word baramin (translated as kind) it cannot be taken seriously. In saying this you are assuming that the Bible is not the Word of God. On what do you base this assumption?
By the way, I do still refer the reader to check out this link which gives further detail as to what we have discovered about the classification of the biblical kinds:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/get-answers/top-ten/myths-about-creation
Adiel wrote: “In saying this you are assuming that the Bible is not the Word of God. On what do you base this assumption?”
Oh dog… On what do I base this “assumption”? Let’s see… since there is no evidence that a god (or gods) exists I figure one probably didn’t pen a book full of contradictions, vile examples of morals, and silly talking snake stories.
And I’m really sorry to break this to ya – but if you’re going to attempt to disprove evolution you’re going to have to define the words you use. I know that makes it tough when you’ve only got an ancient book to go by… but that’s the way it is. Saying a species cannot evolve outside of it’s own “kind” kinda means you have to define what “kind” means. It’s important.
I did enjoy your little dance around the question in the first part of this comment though: “Does not ‘according to its kind’ include whatever is ‘according to its kind’ and exclude whatever is not ‘according to its kind’?”
What does that even mean! Yikes! You creationists us such sloppy logic! I’m dizzy just trying to follow your train of “thought”!
He didn’t answer question 5. He gave a very vague description of evolution, but skipped Part 2: describing natural selection. That’s a pretty important thing to omit.
That’s like being asked to describe cars, and never mentioning that they’re a form of transportation.
All I was saying is that even if we have not found the EXACT equivalent to the modern biological classifcation (which we believe is roughly around the family class, though not exactly) does not render the Scripture meaningless as you suggest, as though we have no idea whatsoever what it is saying.
You mentioned that you assume that the Bible is not the word of God because of the vile examples of morals. What is the standard that you are using to judge the morals of the Bible? And I’m really sorry to break this to ya – but if you’re going to attempt to judge the morals of the Bible you’re going to have to define the standard you use, so that we can see if it is absolute and objective or binding OR relative and subjective and not binding.
I’m afraid that without a proper definition of “kind” a discussion of whether or not they can reproduce is impossible.
However if I am to take your “rough definition” that “kind” means any individual that is related to another within the family classification, then you are absolutely flat wrong. By the scientific definition only individuals within the same species can reproduce producing fertile offspring. If your definition held true, humans would be able to reproduce with orangutans.
In fact, the very acknowledgment that there are hierarchical levels of relatedness between individuals is telling. You corrected me by saying that no, “kind” would not mean species but more family. Family is a scientific term, a taxonomic term that lacks ANY objective meaning in the absence of evolutionary theory.
To briefly answer your question; given an infinite amount of time there is no set limit to the amount of diversity that can originate from a given common ancestor beyond that of the environment of the individuals. Of course, the smaller the amount of time, the less possibility there is for divergence as evolution occurs largely in small steps. The argument of creationists boils down to you can walk from one side of the street to the other, but there is no way to walk from one end of the city to the other. It’s the same exact mechanism, simply given a quantity of time hard to fathom for a human.
One last thing about scientific debates. In order to have a scientific debate you must possess scientific knowledge. That includes being able, when asked, to define the concepts you are arguing for or against. It also includes, when objecting to an established scientific fact, showing exactly what evidence is in error and HOW it is in error, always basing your arguments in scientifically demonstrated concepts. Also, when offering an alternate hypothesis, it is not enough to break down a previous theory (if you are able), you must be able to show scientific evidence in favor of your claim.
From what I’ve seen of your writing, you do not appear to be a Ray Comfort. You don’t seem to mean badly and I could easily believe you truly think there is merit in your stance. Unfortunately you appear to be deeply ignorant of the basic concepts of evolutionary biology as well as the nature of scientific inquiry. I do not say this to insult you, and I’m sorry if it comes across that way, but I sincerely hope that some day you understand that there’s a reason why every credible scientist in the world holds the opposite view on this subject than you, and that the champions of your view aren’t scientists in accredited universities. It’s not a conspiracy, the facts are simply not on your side.
Cheers
Charles,
How do you define, “credible scientist” in the world? The ones who agree with you?
While I would really enjoy continue this conversation I just can’t. But I will include in this post some closing thoughts…
I did not say “exactly” the family kind but roughly. For example, even though secular modern biologists who presuppose naturalism as their starting point, classify humans as apes under the same family, the Bible distinctly reveals that humans are of a different kind than animal kingdom.
As an answer to my question you stated, “To briefly answer your question; given an infinite amount of time there is no set limit to the amount of diversity that can originate from a given common ancestor beyond that of the environment of the individuals.” OK, so you believe LIMITLESS evolution, that is, a bull and a cow, given enough time can evolve into an apple tree or a flea or Einstein. Thanks for the clarification. However, I seriously cannot help but chuckle that you believe such a foolish thing. That is not what the Bible teaches. The Bible teaches that there are limits!
I gotta get going. A final word on this great holiday that we are celebrating today:
Let those who are thankful thank the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, the giver of every good gift! Every good gift you have came from His hand: your life, your family, your friends, everything! And the greatest gift of all? “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”. Praise the Lord!
@Adiel: a bull and a cow
Wouldn’t last four billion years; even if they mated, there wouldn’t be enough genetic diversity. See why we want things defined, re: kind?
So, about your question. Before we start, we should make sure we are on the same page, yes? Okay, so here goes:
Define “cow”, please. Are we talking about the animal itself, excluding all the different kinds of bacteria that usually inhabit the body of a bovine? In your question, how many bovine animals are we talking about here? The stated two, or more? What will the animals eat? In your four billion year timeline, are we excluding ELEs?
Or did you expect something simpler, like “yes” or “no”?
@Adiel: In saying this you are assuming that the Bible is not the Word of God. On what do you base this assumption?
Oh, that’s an easy one: there are no gods.
Slightly more detailed: Assuming an omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent being wrote that book, there would not be so many contradictions and outright errors in it. There would not be any.
My names is “Claudia” not “Charles”, though considering the subject matter, I find the error flattering
It is true that the definition of credible is relatively plastic. However I think that it is not a stretch to say that about 99% (I’m being conservative here) of biologists and biochemists accept evolutionary theory. That would include every single one working at the top 100 universities in the world and every single member of the National Academy of Sciences and equivalent elite institutions throughout the world. A rough estimate, but I’m fairly certain that not far off.
I can’t help but be amused by the next part though. You find it impossible to believe that diversity, given enough time and proper circumstances, is not limited. Part of this probably stems from the fact that you do not understand the mechanisms of evolution in the slightest. However part of it could also be that it is quite understandable that such a thing strains credulity for a regular person.
But your objection is not any of that. Your objection is “It’s not what the Bible teaches!” Well then, it can’t be true, can it? LMAO This is your slam dunk? The Bible. So what happens when I tell you that the Bible has the same scientific credibility as Harry Potter? You can’t use the Bible as a gambit against people who don’t believe it’s true! You can’t even use it against Christians who do believe in it’s god but don’t believe it’s literally true. Your reasoning only works, by definition, with people who already think the way you do!
Adiel, Human are apes, and were classified as such by a biblical creationist before Darwin was even born.
Typical Ray, he’s been given all the examples that he asks for, he just always ignores the examples and then says no gave him any.
The same way he puts out press releases saying no one will debate him, while ignoring the dozen people lined up wanting to debate him.
That’s total bullshit about the missing chapters. I work in publishing and nobody, fucking no publisher would ever remove chapters to adjust the page count. There are countless alternatives, the least of which is reducing text size.
I see you didn’t use my question?
(I’m joking you, Hemant, since mine were rather tongue in cheek. I doubt anyone’s had the nerve to ask it of either one of them but, if I ever have the displeasure of meeting either one of them, I’ll be sure to.)
Sigh. I may be Atheist but I suck, suck, suck at science and only semi-”get” evolution. But even I know those answers were horseshit.
The long term e. coli experiment still ended up with e. coli at the end. The Galapagos Islands finches’ beaks change back and forth from long to short in a regular cycle which corresponds to the availability of different foods. This cycle also closely follows the El Nino- La Nina weather cycles and again, at the end they are still finches. Most of these “icons” of evolutionary evidence have simple explanations when you don’t limit yourself to one biased viewpoint.
Chaz4jc said:
Congratulations- you’ve established that speciation generally takes a long time. Unfortunately, the same mechanism that causes the small changes you mention, continue to operate and accumulate many small changes, until the result is no longer clearly within the old species definition.
For a couple of examples of larger changes, check out the Grant’s latest paper in which they describe the formation of and isolated breeding group on Daphne Major formed following a hybridization event and a subsequent bottle neck. It looks like the early stages of a speciation event.
Also, have a look at the Apple Maggot. The well documented Hawthorn Moth spun off populations which fed on apples following the widespread planting of orchards in the early 1800’s. The two groups no rarely interbreed and are beginning to diverge, again, it appears to be speciation in action- this time a little further along.
Out of curiosity, what “simple explanations” do you believe explain the Galapagos Finches or Lenski’s E. coli without descent with modification by means of natural (or artificial) selection?
Ray talks about loving atheists and everyone else, which doesn’t seem to gel with all of the vitriol that spew’s forth from his mouth on his own Blog site.
It appears another of Monsieur Comfort’s little deceptions – trying in an atheist forum to appear to be something he is most definately not.
I spent 15 years in a church listening to “we don’t hate , we love them”. Just because you say it, even if you believe what you say, doesn’t make it true. Ray and a great many like him are such experts at rationalization and self-delusion that they can motivate themselves with such obvious bullshit while convincing themselves they are fighting for a noble cause.
On the part of professional creationists like Mr. Comfort, this is deliberate. The cartoons which show a wrecking ball labeled “millions of years” crashing into a church are not caused by ignorance. Quite the reverse. They know an accurate understanding of geological time shows Genesis is just another myth. That’s why garbage like “flood geology” is so important to them. In order to defend their lies, they must misunderstood geological time.
And that, thank you very much, is how we know the bible to be false.
Adiel – if we were to leave the bovine family for 4 billion odd years they would indeed evolve into different beings – but only if there was also other life around to make the world habitable and allow them to eat (flora for example).
But here you show your lack of understanding of evolution. As life evolves it becomes more complex. The first life on the planet was extremely simple, nowhere near as complex as a cow! Before I go any further, I am not a biologist, I freely admit – luckily the general theory of evolution is remarkably simple. However, the whole point of natural selection is that life evolves in one direction – to become more suited to their environment. In order for a complex organism like a cow to become a plant, it would have to devolve rather than evolve (or rather, devolve and then evolve in a different direction). Remember we are cousins (of some form or another) to every other living species currently on the planet, not parent or child.
A pig at no point turned into a horse, rather if you go back far enough along their family tree (and it’s a long way back with our intuitive ‘understanding’ of what time is), you will find the same ancestor for the two of them. Likely, at this point, the ancestor will share very little obvious resemblance to today’s pigs or horses. (This is why Comfort’s crocoducks get roundly ridiculed in any scientific circle.)
Best Answer Ever!
Greg said:
That is not actually inherently true. The processes which led to the current diversity of life included an increase in complexity, but it is not necessary that that be the case. You are, however, quite correct that it is unlikely for a bovine to evolve into a plant, largely because of how “plant” is defined and the fact that plants would already be filling plant niches in order for the bovines to survive (ie there would be no opening for selective pressure to become more plant like). If the bovines were, instead, present in a system which left many niches open (including those currently occupied by plants), it is possible for bovines to fill them given enough time and selective pressure.
No, not good enough. No “roughly speaking I believe”. I want a detailed and specific definition that is widely accepted among creationists. Anything less is utterly worthless.
.
What do you mean by “earthlike”? You mean already filled with diverse life like a modern earth? Or are you referring to a planet which is earthlike in temperature and composition but somehow devoid of life?
What I’m getting at is what are the cows going to eat?
Dropping off two members of a fully modern species in a new planet is not something addressed by evolution… That’s more the creationist explanation.
Actually I believe the person in question mentioned that the bible is not the word of god because of the lack of likelihood of the existence of god or gods, the amount of contradictions and the “silly talking snake stories”.
Wow. Everything that most of you accuse Mr. Comfort of doing you do yourselves.
Ray Comfort is mean-spirited . . . he is illogical . . . he misses the point or doesn’t understand etc. Have you read through what is posted here?
You are no different in your approach. You laugh at his banana theory – consider the Bovine to Beetle theory – you’ll laugh til you cry!
A great example of someone being able to destroy his own arguments’ credibility by just opening his mouth. So glad you just moved from question to question and let him stand on his own. Or, rather, fall on his own.
I <3 the part of about loving atheists. Apparently he thinks to love someone is to give them free stuff.
Thanks, Hemant!
Mr. Comfort: Where is the $10,000 you owe me? You ran an offer of $10,000 for anyone producing evidence of transitional fossils. I sent in a convincing entry, but never even heard back from you. I must admit I have begun to question your sincerity in the matter.
Kiera wrote: “Apparently he thinks to love someone is to give them free stuff.”
No kidding! How funny is that?!
Of course I’ve always found religious people’s definition of “love” to be rather odd and, um… evil. Jesus is tortured – that’s just god’s love at work. Sending my atheist ass to hell – again, that’s just god’s love.
So Ray can insult atheists over and over and over again – give them a gift certificate to red lobster – and that’s Ray’s love in action! Nice…
And thanks Tony for clearing up Adiel’s mistake about my position (“I believe the person in question mentioned that the bible is not the word of god because of the lack of likelihood of the existence of god or gods…”)… Exactly!
This sounds like it was based off of my question, and I got the expected response from it. I’m not asking you to refute specific evidence; I am asking if there *could* exist evidence to convince you. There’s none so blind as those that refuse to see.
In other words, you ‘love’ atheists as a potential converts, or as strawmen to box for your audience. If you truly loved us as you say you do, you wouldn’t lie about our arguments and our viewpoints.
Christophe Thill was commenting above on how Comfort et al keeps our (that is, us that adhere to science) vocabulary and our ideas sharp. I do believe there is some truth to this; it has been noted that creationism has only helped in regard to the theory, if not in practice than in education.
However, I do not think we should water down the language. “Red in tooth and nail” is an evolutionary truism, painful as it may be. We are the children of a history of violence -> it is not in the theory that we will find salvation, but in our uniqueness as a species to reflect and recreate ourselves. For this we can thank evolution, but to capitalize on creating meaning, purpose and peace is an existential endeavor, not a scientific one.
In short we must not capitulate to one of the mainstay arguments of creationism which is the fallacy of appeal to consequence. Evolution, nature herself, is violent to life, and life being nature, violent unto itself. And yet our other instincts of nurture and care prevail to now – were we can, via science, intelligence, and expression, extend this to beyond our immediate kin, to beyond our neighborhood block, for the first time in 3 billion years.
Religion recognized this but couldn’t seem to get past the extended family without resorting to murder, in the past all-too-real, under the stay of secular ethics in the form of misinformation and psychological warfare (read: hell).
We non-believers and scientists and artists now must take of the torch. And we too have failed (read: atomic bomb).
Red in tooth and nail, indeed. But as Comfort is a living example, we can deny nature – we just need to do it in a way that does not subvert the truth and benefits the planet.
Make no mistake, Ray has said quite matter of factly that nothing could convince him that Evolution is real. This is despite the fact that he has said that a)species equals kind b) speciation is real c)there are millions of transitional fossils.
But evolution is false!
That is debatable. One of the defining features of E. coli is the lack of citrate metabolism. This particular strain evolved the ability to metabolize citrate, so if you go by this definition then they are no longer E. coli.
The word “baramin” is not interesting without a meaning. As long as it is presented without a known meaning, it has the same value in discussion as a word that really has no meaning.
Knowing what one is trying to express is of informational value. Whether the letters used spell “kind”, “baramin” or “dalgmappc” is pure aesthetic.
Curiously, until this Origin handout trick I had also never really come across Ray Comfort. I don’t think this is necessarily a loss.
He misses the point that scientists don’t need to “have faith” in dating techniques or whatever. If we really have a doubt about a particular measurement technique, we can go and do an experiment or make more observations, to confirm the technique is valid. Then we can publish our findings. This is what science is about.
Faith or belief, simply don’t come into it. I suspect this is where the overly religious just don’t get it – they can’t get their head around the complete lack of necessity for the word “believe” in scientific endeavour.
The Earth is 4.55 (ish) billion years old: This is the result of what we call measurements. Faith not required.
…Don’t suppose he’s read The Making of the Fittest, by Sean B. Carroll? That book looks at the question of evolution from the viewpoint of the genes. Darwin of course, didn’t know about genes. A rather good read; I recommend it.
MarkP said:
I said I wasn’t a biologist!
Having said that, I didn’t think it was my place to try to be precise, given that I would then get numerous things wrong… like that I guess (!). I think I probably got this misapprehension from one of Dawkins books/lectures where he talks about ‘Mount Improbable’ and how there can be multiple peaks at different levels. (He descibes evolution as a process that can only go uphill.)
Thinking about it, it would only make sense that if ‘losing’ genetic information actually enhanced survivability after a change in conditions it would happen.
This is why I love science – regardless of the level of scientific literacy it is always possible to learn something interesting. (As opposed to boring rote learning) Thanks for the correction!
But it does have a meaning. It means “the level of difference that evolution cannot surpass”
Although I put a wink there, I have come to the conclusion that this is the actual definition most creationist have in their heads, they just don’t want to admit it.
In what I still find to be one of the funniest lines written in these comments we have an idea of what creationists think we want when we ask for word definitions.
Adiel wrote: “Does not ‘according to its kind’ include whatever is ‘according to its kind’ and exclude whatever is not ‘according to its kind’?”
That seriously cracks me up every time I read it! Adiel thinks this is enough information for “kind”!
LinzeeBinzee said
That phenomenon occurs often enough that there’s a technical term for it. It’s called “learning.” Would that Ray would indulge in it.
@Greg
Its an understandable and common misconception. The “uphill” Dawkins refers to does not need to be complexity, but can be any advantage. A good example are parasitic bacteria. Ancestral bacteria were all free living. Those populations that adapted to life has a parasite show a decrease in the number of genes and the size of their genomes. Quite simply, fewer genes are required in the controlled environment of the host, so there is a tendency to become less “complex.”
“(”Evolutionary biology is unable to reveal why animals would abandon asexual reproduction in favor of more costly and inefficient sexual reproduction.” [1])”
Why would an omnipotent creator create an inefficient method of reproduction? Not very clever, eh? What’s up with that, Ray?
OH man…
Quite interesting comments here.
There are many comments here that I’ll just cherish and keep for another day’s retorts.
Things like:
- Linzee-Binzee’s comments about Kirk Cameron being ’spoon-fed’ information. (Sounds like Linzee’s been in a few of the spoon-feeding classes in some of the more liberal universities, herself).
-Greg’s comment that “Having said that, I didn’t think it was my place to try to be precise, given that I would then get numerous things wrong…”
(Greg please tell me – precisely – what you feel you are wrong and right about? Or do you not want to put that in print?)
It’s interesting how much you can sometimes learn about a person from that person’s own (mis)statements.
This is bizzare. He puts together cogent thoughts and reasonings that might seem logical to someone only slightly less informed, then goes on with the male/female thing. I can’t understand how someone who seems informed and well spoken can fail to grasp that sexual reproduction increases diversity and thus the “options” for natural selection to “choose” from.
[...] when one of them gets a chance to "explain" themselves. On his blog The Friendly Atheist, Hemant Mehta interviewed Crocoduck/Bananaman Ray Comfort, and reading it is like taking a long, gurgling drink from the Broad Street water pump. His [...]
It’s also important to note that the term “species” in bacteria has a somewhat different definition than for other living beings as bacteria reproduce asexually and also acquire new properties from horizontal transfer of DNA. This makes classification of species trickier and more based on molecular analysis of DNA makeup.
This would make speciation rather different for bacteria than for animals. Either way, both have been observed, and anyone who thinks otherwise needs to spend an afternoon with a fruit fly specialist.
Ray,
I speak for many Christians who love you and appreciate the stand you take for The Truth.
Wow, this time they buzzed and flapped for two days straight. They do swarm to you. They know that you do have the Truth.
May God continue to bless you
Yes o martyr, pointing out how stupid Ray is & his lies clearly proves how right he is.
Damn you worked it out.
Just a comment for Roy Natian ONE: Kenneth Miller is a Catholic and he accepts many of the refutations Ray Comfort dismisses. Catholics are not Christians and do not share the same views or beliefs as Christians! They are mostly pagan. Bowing before statues and dressing up in some crazy out fit and think they are holy. TWO: Researchers from New Jersey’s Princeton University have observed a species of finch in Ecuador’s Galápagos Islands that evolved to have a smaller beak within a mere two decades. Well Duh!! It is still a bird!!! I have a dog (same breed) one is shorter than the other. Woop de Doo!
All I want to say is way to go Ray Comfort good job as always. Love in Christ…<
Yeah no ‘True Christian’… that’s always convincing, right up there with Pascals Wager.
“… in which evolutions have faith.”
‘evolutionists’ perhaps
Ray Comfort gets the ideas of science all wrong (as he always does). Science is not based at all on belief but in challenging beliefs to see what withstands the scrutiny. Anything out of the bible simply does not withstand even the least scrutiny; this is by no means a new development. Ancient records survive and Augustine of Hippo, for example, (~1600 years ago, but his letters are by no means the oldest of surviving evidence) struggled with the relationship between the bible and natural philosophy (what we might call ‘ancient science’). Augustine’s solution was one popular with religious tyrants through the ages: demonize and murder the dissenters.
As people test ideas, many ideas must necessarily be refined. It is outright ridiculous to believe that somehow people can simply come up with a “perfect” idea which does not need to be modified, but people who believe the bible is some sort of magically perfect book may be prone to such magic-thinking. Even the abstract and highly successful field of mathematics does not contain any magically perfect ideas; if anything Godel had demonstrated that no mathematical system can be complete – there will always be a mathematical question which can be asked which cannot be resolved by any specific mathematical system.
Living4Him,
What complete and utter nonsense. We did not “swarm” Ray Comfort. He participated in an interview, and we are now responding to his answers. Leave it to the deluded to simplify any challenges to their faith.
I consider Christianity a “social experiment.” And while “communism” (let’s be honest – no country has ever really practiced communism – just because you call it “communism” does not make it so) may have killed many, Christians have killed far more people throughout the last 2000 years than any single government or theory.
@ Living for him:
Like flies, we swarm to shit.
One thing I found interesting is that Ray read Origin of Species and found it boring. I have no doubt Ray read it as an exercise so he could justify putting an introduction into a book only if he had read it first. I attempted to read the Bible along for a similar strategy, and found it boring no doubt for similar reasons. If you’re reading out of curiosity and interest you’ll enjoy a reading, otherwise it is just a mindless endeavor and consequently boring.
LMAO, very nice. Still though, we aren’t particularly swarming to him. He came into our community and let fly a pile of BS and we are busily cleaning it up. Saying we are swarming to him would be like saying that a KKK member is being swarmed by black people if he entered Harlem in full cone-head regalia and started yelling “N****er!”.
There’s really no point with these people, is there? Every comment is just a repetition of the same thing – no evidence, no facts – just evolution is nonsense and atheists are demons. I take some “comfort” in the fact that in a few generations people like this will just be sad anecdotes…shills for a dying propaganda, caught in an archaic trap of ignorance. You can see in his words just how trapped he is. It really can’t be easy to lie when you, yourself actually depend on Darwin when you eat your food, go to the doctor, and use any technology whatsoever for that matter (i.e. Darwin was one of the great innovators of the scientific method itself). It must be very, very difficult to be frantically patching a sinking ship with a million holes and new leaks springing every second.
Ray Comfort’s gloating over having sneakily paid for an Atheist group’s dinner is the reason why I have refused to allow Christians to pay for my own meals.
Comfort made it very clear to me that there is an ulterior motive in such actions. They are not taken out of friendship, or mutual respect, but out of one-up-man-ship and a “holier than thou” attitude.
It is a passive-aggressive move and is dishonest.
It is also what I’ve come to expect from fundamentalists.
“Faith in radioisotope dating techniques”
Oh please stop this nonsense. The next thing is that we should have (not) faith in gravity.
Comfort is a con man. A criminal. Earning money from people who are scared and he knows that ‘happy to accept evidence’. He is scum.
I have a question. As I read down the long list of comments (some mild, some over-the-top, and some passive-aggressive) I’ve noticed that most atheists restate the fact that Mr. Comfort has gotten the Theory of Evolution entirely wrong. Could someone kindly point out to me what the most recent ‘definition’ (if you will) of evolution is? I’m taking a Biology course at my school, and the things Mr. Comfort mention (about evolution, and its by-products, results, etc.) are very familiar to what I see in the textbook for the class. The textbook is pretty recent, as well (published somewhere in the 2000s). What’s missing?
Danny, just so you don’t think I am taking Ray out of context, you can go to the living waters site and see him say first hand what I am about to tell you. The video is called “Using common sense to debunk evolution”
This is his standard example he’s given it many times.
Now remember Ray has been corrected on this dozens and dozens of times, including quite publically on blogs like Pharyngula which he acknowledged! Before repeating it again and again like on that 700 club clip.
‘When the first dog after millions of years finally evolved eyes, after evolving lungs & heart etc it had to run around desperately to find an independently evolved female dog before it died to mate with and of course this had to happen over and over with every species’
He’s also said that if evolution were true then you should find crosses of modern animals which of course leads to the now famous crocoduck.
So while on one hand using the Crocoduck as his definition of a transitional fossil he says ‘there are no transitional fossils’ he also has said ‘there are millions of transitional fossils’, so it’s hard to keep clear exactly what his dogma is from day to day.
His intro has pages and pages of flat out lies about evolution and related fields. If you can ‘name’ fossil he lists it as a fake. So Ida, Lucy, Java Man etc, all fake.
He’s also said that Darwin said that Humans reproduced asexually before evolving sex.
In fact here is a post I made on his blog in response to a person who thought his intro to Origin was 100% truth.
I asked her
Her response was to call me a liar and leave in a huff.
@ Danny: In its most simplified from, change in allele frequency between generations of the same population, fueled by random mutation and directed by non-random selection.
Various factors like niche-filling and isolation split populations and permit groups to develop differently.
“Species” tend to emerge fluently like branches. Not in dramatic, abrupt flashes, as Ray often seems to say.
I would also like to add that taxology is a human invention.
A pelican and an ostrich are indeed still both birds, but “bird” is a just a name, and largely irrelevant. It is the actual differences between the animals we care about.
I too find Ray Comfort to be dishonest.
The fact that I have had a cold most years indicates that viruses have “evolved” in that time to evade our bodies defences.
Case closed. He has faith but not a wise mind. My “God” gave me a brain in order for me to know the glory of all of his creation in all of the billions of years it has been developing.
On another topic.
No “ism”, “ity” or “ology” killed millions of people. Deranged or Greedy or misled people killed people.
Communism has never been truly implemented.
“Capitilism” has government reins because it wouldn’t work either.
Democracy is not implemented in present times. The closest we have is a quasi-democratically elected Oligarchy.
Curses! This is spam, and I won’t be offended if it is deleted, but I must lament that I spelled “from” what was intended as “form”. xP
I can’t stand it when Comfort (among other people) whip out the “atheists are responsible for millions of death” trash. If he can find a group of people that killed, discriminated, persecuted and otherwise made life a living hell for other people that was not only explicitly atheist, but committed their atrocities explicitly in the name of atheism, he might have a point.
His usual fallback on Mao and Stalin are completely irrelevant because they did what they did in the name of political idealism and in the pursuit of power, not to spread atheism or quash theism. On the other hand, one can name several historical and modern atrocities that WERE committed in the name of one God or another.
Furthermore, Hitler may have been “perverting” the message of Christianity, but it still stands that Hitler believed that man was created by God and that he believed that no organism can deviate from its original form:
“For it was by the Will of God that men were made of a certain bodily shape, were given their natures and their faculties” -Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, vol. ii, ch. x
“The fox remains always a fox, the goose remains a goose, and the tiger will retain the character of a tiger.” -Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, vol. i, ch. xi
“Looking at Nature tells us, that in the realm of plants and animals changes and developments happen. But nowhere inside a kind shows such a development as the breadth of the jump , as Man must supposedly have made, if he has developed from an ape-like state to what he is today.” -Adolf Hitler, Tischgesprache im Fuhrerhauptquartie
I also want to comment on the banana issue. He says that there is no evidence that the banana has changed in the last 2000 years, as if that’s supposed to disprove evolution. But evolution has never purported that change occurs rapidly and suddenly (as is clearly what he believes a la crocoduck), or even occurs constantly overtime. Archaeological evidence suggests that initial wild banana domestication and cultivation occurred in Southeast Asia tens of thousands of years ago, and was later more widely introduced to other regions through the advent of Islam.
I’ve gone on for quite a bit, but my point is that there is no doubt that Ray Comfort is, as Dawkins puts it, an ignorant fool. His career is frequently punctuated by faulty logic and wild, baseless assumptions, and he has made his lack of understanding of the theory of evolution grossly apparent many times. For me at least, the only question is whether he is willfully ignorant or not.
Qingwei I would contend that Hitler should be abandoned by both Christians and atheists as an example of anything. His personal religious beliefs were vague, at best. Certainly he drew on religious beliefs (not just Christian, also traditional Germanic) and exploited them to manipulate the masses, but I don’t think religion was what was responsible for the Holocaust, save for how it contributed to the anti-semitism that was so deftly exploited by the Nazis themselves.
The Inquisition and the Crusades however, as well as modern Islamic terrorism, have clear religious links.
Nazism and Stalinism are in fact examples that show us that the dangerous qualities of religion don’t necessarily need a supernatural premise. Absolute indoctrination, faith over rational thinking, an intolerance for dissent, deification of a human (or worship of a deity), can allow for the justification of any number of atrocities. Religion just happens to be the most common manifestation, but it’s not the only one.
“The long term e. coli evolutionary experiment has shown evolutionary adaptations in a lab”
Very misleading “evidence”. The experiment, as I read it in the wikipedia article, resulted in specialized e.coli. This is nowhere near what Darwin claimed, which is that you’re going to go from bacteria to humans (if you step back and look at the big picture). It is also worth noting that the specimens went through “enough spontaneous mutations that every possible single point mutation in the E. coli genome should have occurred multiple times”. And even after that, the most notable adaptations were the ability to get energy from a new source and a rounder shape. How does this give credence to the bigger picture of evolution?
Not misleading, you are simply asserting something that no one was expecting. No one, least of all Lenski thought if he grew enough e.coli one might eventually mutate into a person.
What most detractors have to ignore is this wasn’t ‘leave e.coli for a long time and see what happens’. Lenski put the e.coli under a harsh selective pressure (the availability of food) and he saw after so many generations multiple mutations that enabled the e.coli to use the food source that was previous unavailable to it.
So you have multiple mutations over time adding up to a new feature that helped the e.coli peform better than e.coli which didn’t have the new feature.
That’s pretty much evolution in a nutshell right there.
BathTub, I admire your persistence, but I don’t think it’s going to help much.
The basic issue is that creationists are unwilling (or unable) to accept that the mechanism that allows E. coli to metabolize in new ways is the same one that eventually leads to speciation. The reaction is basically one of stamping their foot and yelling “No!”.
It’s the same mechanism, it’s just a mere matter of time scale. There is no barrier that allows “this much variance” but not “THIS much variance”. The only barriers are selective pressures. Speciation has been observed and even provoked (in Drosophila, as I recall). Stop asking for a different mechanism for the “big changes”. There isn’t one.
However just so I can smile a bit, any creationist willing to tell me when E. coli would cease to be E. coli and become another species is welcome to. I’d love reading your opinion.
Roy Nation said:
Another instance of evolution being observed:
Researchers from New Jersey’s Princeton University have observed a species of finch in Ecuador’s Galápagos Islands that evolved to have a smaller beak within a mere two decades.
“Instant” Evolution Seen in Darwin’s Finches, Study Says
Roy…that’s just a finch with a longer beak…variation within a species as Ray said.
An E. coli with teeth, six legs, and three layers of skin would still only be an E. coli with teeth, six legs, and three layers of skin, of course.
They expect the name itself to mutate, it seems.
First, please read this short little piece, I think I did a fairly good job laying out the difference between hypothesis, theory and law.
Second, there is a *LAW* of gravity and a *THEORY* of gravity. Both terms are equally valid but have different meanings.
The *LAW* of gravity says what happens when you are standing on the surface of the Earth and I drop a brick on your head. It has no power to explain *WHY*, it only explains what happens when I let go. The *THEORY* of gravity attempts to explain *WHY* gravity works the way it does to make that brick fall on your head (and is usually followed by a *LOT* of math).
Laws are based on observation. Theory is based on hypotheses that have been proven and refined by experimental evidence. When Ray Comfort uses “theory” he really means “hypothesis”.
If I were king of the world for one minute, I would spend that time educating people on the difference between hypothesis, law and theory.
For the sake of science and reason, *PLEASE* educate yourself and use the proper terminology… and if you can do so politely, please correct improper uses of the terms.
..Ch:W..
@Ray Natian
Ray said simply that adaptations have been observed “within a kind.” This still doesn’t prove Darwinian evolution…
Can anyone justify why the scientific method which has been used for at least 1,000 years is totally ignored by evolutionists?
Care to explain yourself Danny? Currently your post makes no sense at all.
I’m sure the millions of scientists (of all religions) working on biology and related fields would be quite interested to learn they aren’t doing science.
For example how is the discovery of Tiktaalik a not comprehensive use and validation of the Theory of Evolution & Geology and the Scientific Method?
Make no mistake, adaptations “within a kind” (“kind” here obviously referring to a population of finches) is what the theory of evolution attempts to explain, as you would know had you read my previous response to you.
[...] over at Friendly Atheist was able to get Ray Comfort to respond to an interview. It’s worth taking a look just to see how his brain works. For instance: Hemant: What is the [...]
[...] a big fat tool. I was reading an interview with Ray Comfort over at Friendly Atheist. (Found HERE.) This question and answer stood out to me specifically: Hemant: You write on your website that [...]
[...] Mehta over at Friendly Atheist was able to get Ray Comfort to respond to an interview. It’s worth taking a look just to see how Comfort’s brain works. For instance: Hemant: What [...]
I’d love to know what Ray comfort thinks about the new discovery that much of his touted introduction – those bits which are actual fact, are actually plagiarised from other histories and biographies of Darwin.
“As usual, the explanation [as] to why we have 1.4 million kinds with both male and female was ignored.”
….Because it’s obvious to anybody with half a brain? Very early on in the evolutionary process, somewhere right down near the base of the evolutionary tree, gender evolved. And it worked so well for breeding that everything above that point on the tree (i.e. everything that came later) kept it. The same reason that the eye only had to have evolved once.
Comfort is a retard, he really is.
Why are so many of you pretending you don’t understand that Ray’s bannana monologue was anything but a joke. For all the bragging of reason and intelligence on here I see alot of people very confused even after Ray clearly explains it was meant as a joke but because he didnt have an audience for the laughs people took it seriously.
I actually appreciated the way this interview was done. I respect Hemant for engaging in this type of dialogue. It allows people to truly hear both sides and make their own judgments.
Folks, you can bash Ray all you want. And you can hold your hands over your ears, stamp your feet, and scream as loud as you want that God doesn’t exist, and that He didn’t create everything. You can do that and no really authentic Christian is going to try to twist your arm to make you believe. But God does love you – each and everyone of you posting here. He loves you so much that He verifiably hung on a cross 2000 years ago to pay for your sin so that you wouldn’t have to, and then verifiably rose from the dead – witnessed by secular historians – in order to prove it. You’re not hurting God by denying Him and hating Him – you’re hurting yourselves, but you just can’t see it yet. Your anger comes from not wanting to be wrong in something you so strongly believe in. You want your freedom to do as you wish without having to answer to anyone. And so you shall have it, in the here and now. But when your last breath comes, and you know that eternity will begin in the next few seconds, it still won’t be too late to cry out for mercy and forgiveness. All you have to do is ask – if you can get past your pride.
As a Christian who believes in evolution, I have a hard time comprehending WHY he’s so intent on disproving evolution. He has good arguments against it, but even he says it doesn’t matter what you believe, but knowing God is more important.
I agree with everything Ray says up until he talks about how if you’re a christian, you HAVE to accept EVERYTHING the bible says as true. Why? Jesus and the bible are separate things, it’s a trinity, not a quadernity! LOL
I’d like to invite him to come over to a quaker meeting some time. There are many christians who do not follow the Luther doctrine of ’sola scriptura’.
Custador, funnily enough it’s because Ray is lying.
A quick look over at Amazon shows that there is a while chapter in the book on Evolution and Sex. Chapter 12.
AJ, that is only Ray’s excuse now.
This just shows he is beyond all hope. I know some YEC at work, and none of them are confused by this.
I do say that of all the flavors of Christianity, I like the Quakers the best.
Ray Comfort is actually dumb. He’s not lying to preserve the message; he’s literally a moron. What he lacks in knowledge, he matches with an inability to reason. How embarrassing.
Your questions and method revealed Ray to be a very stupid man, Hemant. Thank you.
I love how everyone is just slamming him. Obviously this is fight that no one will ever win. Get down off of your soap box and realize that evolution (or creation) is FAITH! You can’t prove it…period. You can’t even call it science. “Science” cannot prove or disprove evolution, creation, God, the absence of God, or anything like that. Why? because you can’t observe it.
This made me laugh…The Bible was given by God…who cannot lie (or He would cease to be God) That is why Christians accept the Bible as true. If they don’t, they are hypocrites. The Bible isn’t a book where you can pick and choose what you want.
This guy is an obvious con artist. He is eloquent and tactical enough to know that he is just fooling a bunch of buffoons in to buying his books or attending his appearances.
As an aside, I would encourage anyone impressed with Comfort’s understanding of evolution to pick up a good book on the subject. I am not a scientist, so the topic for me wasn’t exactly easy. But with mere hours of study on the topic, you will run circles around Comfort.
Rationalist,
I don’t think the word ‘verfifiable’ means what you think it means.
Wait..Rationalist…
You wrote that God “…verifiably rose from the dead – witnessed by secular historians…”?
Could you elaborate on that please??
Matt…
Gotta disagree with you:
Evolution isn’t faith. Faith is waking up in a room where all the shades are down so you can’t see what the weather is like, but you just believe it’s sunny or snowing or whatever.
Science (in this case, evolution) is peeking through holes in the shades & trying to figure out what the weather is like, & having other hole-peekers do the same to see if you’re right or wrong.
Well, Felix, I think it means the same thing as Webster does – capable of being verified, although he and I spell it a little differently from the way you do.
Folks, when I said “verifiably”, I’m referring to the chain of witnesses’ testimonies as recorded by historians such as Josephus, Tertullian, and Justin Martyr (before he turned from Platonism) only decades after the resurrection. No, they weren’t sitting on the rocks watching as Christ came out of the tomb, but they most certainly talked to those that saw Him after He did – because for them to attempt to fabricate a false story into a historical event (unlike today’s modern media) or report an event without their utmost dedication to accuracy, would mean total discreditation of their work and an end to their reputable standings.
People like Ray are one of the reasons I finally had to let go of the remnants of my faith and accept atheism. I finally realized that for me to be honest, I had to put my own beliefs under the same rigorous examination that I had creationism. So thanks, Ray, Lee, Ken, etc. The fact that you maintained your intentional and dishonest ignorance against all standards and levels of evidence led me away from superstition and into the light of reason.
Oh, and the net deaths vs saved lives, even if you do dishonestly count communism against atheists, the count is still a couple billion lives saved due to atheist science from Borlaug or Salk.
You know, I live in Costa Rica, we were the first “banana republic”, I can take photos to prove him the existance of that wild bananas, the plantains, their hybrids and the commercial seedless triploids and the genetics behind them…
What I’m doing?, I can show him the highest diversity of bananas in the world and is’nt going to make difference for him! They’re the same kind! They’re the same kind! He’s going to say.
The Friendly Athiest simply asked him questions-good to see actual dialogue. A couple of points in no particular order:
I personally feel that science is, like many things we humans do, simply, and only, a way of thinking. Specifically, an organizational method suited very well to observation, and experimentation. And that’s ALL it is. A handy system. With a rather narrow margin of usage. Indeed, personal opinion here, I tend to view the veneration of alleged ‘rational’ thought as leading to athiesm, or whatever one wishes to call it, as seperate issues. As a non-Christian, non-pagan, non everything, I could care less what one thinks they might believe in, insofar as the nature of it all. Those two points have little to do with each other. said ‘em anyways.
That being said, something I feel I must point out-in the dialogue about who did what. Fact: the monotheistic faiths have committed atrocities over two thousand years-very roughly 100,000 thousand or so-over 2000 years. Fact: Pol Pot, Chairman Mao, Stalin, the Jacobites, and quite a few of Hitlers henchmen, committed, in 100 years, murder to the tune of one hundred million, possibly more. I am not saying that anyone did this, BECAUSE they were religious or athiest-I am saying they did it while BEING athiest or monotheistic. And that those who self-identify as secularist, athiest, objective materialist and so on, simply massacred more, to the tune of tens of thousands a day, not including eugenics. In other words, for those who self-identify as athiests-you have a massive PR problem. And forgiveness will not come from anyone, by avoiding the issue. Whether through denial, by saying that was in the past, or through obfuscation on the issue. Face it, face it directly, with honesty, admit what was done, and the possibilty, inherent perhaps (this is my own personal opinion here)in the actual form athiesm itself takes, of further atrocities. After all-the father of the A-bomb, and Dawkin’s idol? A secularist-and we can now kill the planet dozens of times over. If such simple things are beyond an athiest, then yes, repetition of said atrocities will inevitably re-occur-or, more accurately, it would appear this is a major reason why many seem to be very un-open to athiesm. Come to us with clear dialogue and honesty, and a solution to these problems, from within your ranks, and then communication may be possible.
He’s truly amazing! How does he keep all that stupidity just coming and coming and coming. . .
Ray Comfort loves atheists but thinks that God condemns them to eternal torment when they die…
Wait, does that make Comfort a hypocrite? Or does it make him Jesus?
I’ve not read one substantive objective rebuttal in this forum for the issue of why atheists don’t believe in God, or against Ray Comfort’s claims – all I’ve seen is a bunch of hate spewing from people with no real arguments and a whole lot of hot air. I wonder who the real fool is, Ray Comfort or the ones here throwing imaginary “rocks”?
After reading this interview I decided to write a full rebuttal to the PDF file “The Banana Controversy” which Ray mentions as “evidence the banana has not changed its shape.” You can read it at http://www.truth-saves.com/Ray_Comfort_Banana.php
Ray,
At its (sic) most abstract, the theory of evolution is an algorithm; that is, a recipe. Here it is:
reproduce
compete
repeat
I have implemented an evolutionary algorithm in C++, and it works. It solves problems in the real world.
To paraphrase Laurie Anderson, This is not a story that my teachers tell. It is something that I wrote, myself.
I’m interested in your response.
Evolution postulates the following formula:
[random mutations] x [random selection] = organisms that are increasingly more survivable, more complex, and more intelligent.
Unfortunately, this formula cannot and does not work. Don’t believe it? Try this. Take any working computer program. Introduce random mutations to the code at any level. Then randomly select whether the new program survives. Repeat.
I guarantee your “evolving” program will crash well before any new, useful, and working program is created. In fact, you will NEVER produce a new and useful program. Not even in 14 billion years.
It’s the same with biological “evolution.” Random mutation of the genes in a given organism, plus “selection” by totally random and constantly changing forces cannot yield, over time, anything but degraded genetic information and, ultimately, a very handicapped and unfit organism. (Many genetic mutation experiments have produced nothing but horribly handicapped animals. None have produced a new animal with new organs and capabilities.)
Of course, in a given environment, recessive traits contained in the (God-created) existing gene may become more prominent, leading to small variations which improve adaptability. However, actually mutating a set of genes over and over will produce nothing but a very sick and unfit animal that will eventually be unable to survive in any environment.
Evolution simply cannot work.
AJ “Why are so many of you pretending you don’t understand that Ray’s bannana monologue was anything but a joke. For all the bragging of reason and intelligence on here I see alot of people very confused even after Ray clearly explains it was meant as a joke but because he didnt have an audience for the laughs people took it seriously.”
Sure, to us it was always a joke. It’s only been a joke to Ray since it sunk in to his thick head that, even for him, it’s a terrible argument. Of course, that’s not stopping him from pondering his other terrible arguments.
“I actually appreciated the way this interview was done. I respect Hemant for engaging in this type of dialogue. It allows people to truly hear both sides and make their own judgments.”
It’s like watching a boxing match where one side refuses lift his arms then, after getting pummeled, insists that the other guy never landed a punch.
matt “I love how everyone is just slamming him.”
Pointing out his willful ignorance (and trying to help spoonfeed him the facts) is not “slamming”. Any ire he receives, he’s earned.
“Obviously this is fight that no one will ever win. Get down off of your soap box and realize that evolution (or creation) is FAITH!”
Even if that’s true, which it’s not, evolution is backed up by the facts of the real world. Creationism is supported only by ignoring or distorting those facts.
“You can’t prove it…period.”
Proofs are for math. The rest deal in probabilities.
“This made me laugh…The Bible was given by God…who cannot lie (or He would cease to be God) That is why Christians accept the Bible as true.”
Really? Can you get Him to autograph my KJV?
“If they don’t, they are hypocrites. The Bible isn’t a book where you can pick and choose what you want.”
I assume you own slaves.
Rationalist “Folks, when I said ‘verifiably’, I’m referring to the chain of witnesses’ testimonies as recorded by historians such as Josephus, Tertullian, and Justin Martyr (before he turned from Platonism) only decades after the resurrection.”
Wow. So what you’re saying is that Elvis really is alive and John Frum will soon return!
[...] Comfort, sum fólk kanska kenna frá The Way of the Master og banan-marruni, tosaði herfyri við Hemant Mehta, vinarliga ateistin. Høvið er at Ray júst hevur givið eina serliga útgávu av Darwinsa Origin of Species út, har [...]
People, who espouse such ignorance the likes of Ray Comfort, are why I lost my faith and am now an atheist.
Seeing as how we’ve apparently been linked from a creationist website I think it’s worth noting a few things about our tragically ignorant creationist commenters.
Notice how they say that evolutionary theory (and presumably gravity and atomic theory too) requires faith just like religion, or that it’s “just a theory”, or that there is no “proof” etc.
All of this points to a dearth of understanding, but it goes much deeper than merely understanding evolutionary theory. They lack a fundamental understanding of what science is and how it works. They don’t even know what the word “theory” means, or what qualifies as “evidence” or the concept of burden of proof, or any aspect of the scientific method, or the difference in the practical sense between knowledge and faith.
We speak completely different languages. It’s very difficult if not outright impossible in some ways to discuss scientific issues with someone who doesn’t even know what science really is, let alone what the data is. To top it all off they are trained to think that there is no actual need for education in the field in order to opine on it. They don’t realize that evidence based knowledge is fundamentally different (and superior) to faith based beliefs, so they see themselves on equal ground to actual sciedntists on a subject they know nothing about.
I suppose we should be thankful they don’t behave the same way about Oncology or Civil Engineering.
Joe Sixpack:
“Fact: Pol Pot, Chairman Mao, Stalin, the Jacobites, and quite a few of Hitlers henchmen, committed, in 100 years, murder to the tune of one hundred million, possibly more.”
Godwin’d yourself immediately. You do realize that the vast majority of Hitler’s henchmen, and Hitler himself, were Christian, and Hitler was executing religious ideas? Evolution does not support genocide or artificial pressures. It does not support “master races” or “chosen people”. Those are religious artifices. Mao and Stalin were setting up huge cults of personality, basically they WERE their own religion.
The “father of the A bomb and Dawkin’s personal idol”? Oppenheimer? He who regretted it and stated it should never be used? And yet who actually used it? Truman, who was a what? A Christian. Not that your post has any point beyond being a huge subterfuge of hiding historical facts. To lay a mere 100,000 deaths at the feet of religion, and Christianity in particular, is only touching the surface. This figure doesn’t include Hitler’s holocaust, as stated above. It doesn’t include the decimation of the native americans or other indigenous populations when christian “missionaries” moved in. The Spanish Inquisition alone had a an estimated death toll of somewhere between 43,000 to 80,000, and that is when the population of the world was a mere fraction of what it is today.
I suggest you take your own advice:
“Face it, face it directly, with honesty, admit what was done.”
Do I expect you to take responsibility for these actions? Of course not, you didn’t perform them. But I do want you to realize that your “facts” are so erroneous as to be laughable. Please get an education, and stop mindlessly repeating figures you read on a Christian website. Expand your mind, learn to use skepticism, not dogma, as your filter for information.
Claudia above hit the nail on the head. In fact, some of his answers show such an impressively concise and well-phrased misunderstanding about how science works, that I’m considering clipping some quotes to use on the final exam for the philosophy of science class I’m teaching.
“Read the quotes below from someone who denies the theory of evolution. What fundamental errors is he making in talking about the role of theories and evidence in science?”
Comfort just can’t resist throwing out the Hitler nonsense, and the vile “atheist Communists killed 100 million people” smear.
Why is it, when these evangelicals play body count, they always leave out the millions of victims of “godly” capitalist colonialism (like the ten million Congolese killed by the good Christian Belgians at the end of the 19th century, to give just one example…)
Not only is this silly game of “body count” dishonest, vulgar, irrational and ugly it has nothing to do with whether or not the theory of evolution is true, or whether or not God exists.
(The point here is not that religious belief is more destructive than atheism, by the way; I had the same of kind of reaction to parts of Sam Harris’s book. Attacking people’s personal beliefs, whatever they are, by falsely associating them with someone else’s atrocities (what I call “playing Body Count”) is a loser’s game and we atheists shouldn’t play it either…)
If you all truly want the truth, you must be open to anything. God knocks at your door. He doesn’t force himself in. The truth is there; you just have to want to see it no matter what it is. I listened to my college professors speak all of the cliche evolution, atheist fallacy, but I have come to realize that philosophically, logically, and historically, Christianity is the best explaniation for all, and Atheism is the most intellectually empty “ism” there is.
As I introspect the reasoning’s in this blog, only one thought infiltrates my cerebellum, “pretentious”. Without exception when a person of faith has a point of view that diverges from an Atheist, the Atheist invariably attacks the intellect of the person of faith. Not all people of faith are deficient. Indeed I have accosted many people of faith and have been positively stimulated by their dialogue. However my recollection of discourse with Atheist has not been as favorable.
People of faith have their “village idiots” as do Atheist. One may evaluate the Atheist acumen with an antagonistic composition if one were to communicate with the average “uneducated” Atheist. I know countless intellectual persons of faith (with PhD’s) and am intrigued by their intelligence. Often their scrutiny of my own “Faith” (or lack thereof) was reasonably disputed.
Mr.C, the selection process is not random. It is based on which offspring survive long enough to reproduce successfully. In a cold environment, having enough insulation to stay warm is selected for, while wasting resources on having too much insulation is selected against. In fact, behaviors such as sharing body heat and altruistically working to take shifts protecting a peer group against the elements (as seen in emperor penguins) can be selected for.
Just one question:
Why interview Ray Comfort? Exactly what is it that we need to know about him that merits giving him free, undeserved press of ANY kind?
It is not as if his arguments and positions have not been soundly refuted.
It is not as if he deserves to be heard.
It is not as if he has ANY knowledge to impart.
So I ask again, why give a useless, lying or ignorant (or both) individual, a platform and therefore even the appearance of credence?
Two things: (1) He states that Christians can believe in evolution, but then he continually uses the word “atheists” to refer to “people who believe in Evolution”. It’s VERY confusing. (2) He continually harps on the idea of “species”, and that we’ve no evidence that one species evolves into another species. The problem is that Comfort doesn’t know what a species is. He talks about species like they are immutable classifications, almost divinely inspired. Of course he believes this because of his ridiculously strict reading of a mythological text, but that doesn’t excuse his ignorance of the history of science and taxonomic systems.
Joan said,
“”Matt…
Gotta disagree with you:
Evolution isn’t faith. Faith is waking up in a room where all the shades are down so you can’t see what the weather is like, but you just believe it’s sunny or snowing or whatever.
Science (in this case, evolution) is peeking through holes in the shades & trying to figure out what the weather is like, & having other hole-peekers do the same to see if you’re right or wrong.”"
Problem is Joan, the foundation of all science is induction which presupposes the uniformity of nature (i.e. the future will be like the past). What is your basis for expecting the future to be like the past?
This was a good and thought provoking interview.
:\ I see that it isn’t very fruitful to explain one’s position.
They argue against “random selection” still.
Do they really disagree, then? If I say “roses are red”, and I hear the objection that “roses are not blue”, can my opponent be anything but a troll? Is there really a disagreement about facts?
It’s presented as a disagreement, but the presentation doesn’t ring true.
:\
In message No. 54, on November 26th, Adiel said:
“I think its silly to say, “Since we are not sure what exactly is modern biological classification of the ancient word baramin (translated as kind) it cannot be taken seriously.”
Baramin is NOT an ancient word. It is an abortion dreamed up on the basis of Hebrew words by someone who knew NOTHING about the Hebrew language. Surprising, since one would expect that people who claim to take the Bible so seriously might take the time to learn something about it, and the languages it was originally written in.
It appears that evolution and science are not the only knowledge they have contempt for.
“In saying this you are assuming that the Bible is not the Word of God. On what do you base this assumption?”
On what do you base your own assumption? The Bible itself says that Jesus is the Word of God. You don’t seem to take it very seriously.
Cheers
I get the impression he regards a transitional fossil as a singular event, instead of a gradual process. He actually expects scientists to unearth a half T-rex/BlueJay.
Mr. C said: Evolution postulates the following formula:
[random mutations] x [random selection] = organisms that are increasingly more survivable, more complex, and more intelligent.
You made a critical error right in the beginning. Evolution does not postulate the formula [random mutations] x [random selection] = organisms that are increasingly more survivable, more complex, and more intelligent.
Evolution postulates the formula [random mutations] x [NON-RANDOM selection] = organisms that are better adapted to their environments
Garbage in, garbage out as they say. (And be assured, anything Ray has to say about evolution is garbage.) If you start with a completely incorrect definition of evolution, then of course it won’t work. Natural selection is the very antithesis of randomness.
But here comes the real test: Now that your mistake has been pointed out and corrected, will you admit it? Or will you, like Ray, willfully ignore the truth and continue to use the incorrect definition because it’s more convenient to your agenda?
Specifically addressing Ray’s point thus:
I am one of those Christians-turned-Atheist. I did not turn solely because of the poor quality of my Christianity, that was, fortunately for me, the start of my questioning. I looked back at my years of Christian thinking and realized that I was wrong about a lot of things. I love science, and I’ve tried for years to rationalize the teachings of the bible to fit a scientific mindset. It just didn’t work, and in the end, I began listening and reading smarter people than I.
I don’t understand enough of evolution or biology to be able to talk in great detail about it, but I’ve learned. That’s the important part. Christianity is not about learning. It’s about keeping an ignorant look at society, fingers in your ears ‘la-la-I-can’t-hear-you.’ When I questioned “how can god fit into evolution?” I began to immediately learn. Through learning, through rational thought, and through listening, I’ve realized that belief in anything related to Christianity / Creationism / Intelligent Design requires belief in one thing – that the bible is true and literal – and I discarded that belief while still a Christian.
Nope. He still doesn’t get it. In this short paragraph he managed to demonstrate that he doesn’t understand what the theory of evolution is, repeat the tired line that “evolution is just a theory” (thereby disqualifying himself from any sort of serious discussion about science), and ultimately dodge the question by focusing on instead on the completely unrelated field of abiogenesis (something I’m sure he’s been warned about a thousand times already).
Kevin said,
“”I am one of those Christians-turned-Atheist.”"
Hi Kevin, I have a question for you; Did you know the Lord?
“”I did not turn solely because of the poor quality of my Christianity, that was, fortunately for me, the start of my questioning. I looked back at my years of Christian thinking and realized that I was wrong about a lot of things. I love science, and I’ve tried for years to rationalize the teachings of the bible to fit a scientific mindset.”"
I think perhaps you are mistaken as to what the definition of a Christian is, Kevin. A Christian is someone who holds God and His Word as their ultimate standard and the foundation of their reasoning. One cannot reason TO the truth of the Bible if it is their ultimate standard, they MUST reason FROM it as their basis for interpreting the world around them, not vice versa. One cannot be a Christian without having fully submitted themselves to Christ as Lord. This seems to be where you have erred.
“”It just didn’t work, and in the end, I began listening and reading smarter people than I.”"
Sounds like you began to gravitate towards those who were willing to tell you what you had been wanting to hear all along.
“”I don’t understand enough of evolution or biology to be able to talk in great detail about it, but I’ve learned. That’s the important part. Christianity is not about learning. It’s about keeping an ignorant look at society, fingers in your ears ‘la-la-I-can’t-hear-you.’”"
What you don’t realize though is that ONLY Christianity can provide us with the necessary preconditions for knowing anything, as one cannot account for knowledge apart from the God of the Bible.
Those who deny the God of the Bible are merely suppressing the truth to avoid accountability to Him, choosing rather to be their own god than to submit to God. This is the very epitome of ’sticking one’s fingers in their ears and saying la-la-I-can’t-hear-you’.
“”When I questioned “how can god fit into evolution?” I began to immediately learn.”"
As I am sure you have found, God does not ‘fit into evolution’ as Christianity and evolution are totally incompatible with one another. In order to assume evolution to be true, one must reject the Biblical account of creation, and therefore the truth of the Bible. The result, of course, is sheer absurdity and foolishness.
“”Through learning, through rational thought, and through listening, I’ve realized that belief in anything related to Christianity / Creationism / Intelligent Design requires belief in one thing – that the bible is true and literal – and I discarded that belief while still a Christian.”"
And unfortunately, in doing so you also discarded any foundation for truth, rationality, and knowledge. I sincerely recommend that you repent and surrender to God through Jesus Christ.
God Bless you Ray. Keep up the good work!!!
Maybe the proof of evolution is directly within Richard Dawkins, afterall he “spontaneously evolved” into a chicken when he was challenged to a debate by the banana man!!!
By the way … this message evolved on its own.
scmike, Do you beat your slaves according to the bible’s directions? Require that your wife’s head be covered at the right times? Stone your children when they are disrespectful? Refuse to wear mixed fabrics? Play football with a regulation pigskin? Think it is right for small children to be killed by bears for laughing at a bald man? Do you believe that your god’s might is enough to defeat any nation as long as they do not have iron chariots? Either you accept and practice all parts of the bible or you aren’t really a Christian, right?
This is the truth of your bible. It is the record of an often brutal group of tribes surrounded by often hostile neighbors, in a frightening world with earthquakes, fires and floods. It is how they explained the world around them through fables and tales, especially those that they borrowed from their Babylonian neighbors.
The problem is, we aren’t the bronze age culture of ancient Israel or the iron age world of Roman Jerusalem, but we live in an age of science and reason, where questions and doubt should be welcomed, and when evidence based answers are given, you should gladly accept them after investigation, not continue to wallow in the ignorance of a bygone era.
Ray Comfort knows that he is wrong. He has been corrected over and over, has admitted that he was wrong, and continues to say the same wrong things. He is a professional liar, a liar with a cause. If someone realizes that part of the bible is a faulty myth, they might begin to question the rest of it. By being so confidently dishonest, he helps people remain ignorant about the world around them. All while making a tidy profit from his confidence games.
If the bible doesn’t fit the evidence, you really should admit that the evidence might not be wrong, but rather that the bible is in error.
“Or are the possibilities limitless eg can a bull and a cow evolve into a parakeet? No, right?”
Yes, theoretically they can. They each evolved from a common ancestor, and each’s ancestor from that common ancestor was a viable species. Thus, there is at least one viable evolutionary path from one to the other. The odds of it happening are vanishingly small, but they are not zero.
Dear Robster and Butchkitties,
Thanks for your gracious comments. In reply, let me again suggest that you try the experiment: Take any working computer program, introduce random changes to the code at any level. Repeat.
What do you think will happen first? A) The program will crash. B) A completely new and functioning program will be created.
Selecting for features that tend to “improve” the program won’t help the theory of evolution, because that would be introducing intelligence into the equation (which evolution does not permit.)
(In fact, this is the fatal flaw in the avida program.)
Let us now look at your notion that selection is non-random. The phrase that encapsulates this idea is “survival of the fittest.” This phrase is well-known and often repeated, but it is a logical fallacy. A tautology: What organisms survive? The most fit. Which are the most fit? Those that survive. Well which ones survive…
The fact is, environmental pressures are applied completely at random. They vary greatly in type, intensity, and duration. And there’s no way to predict the effect of any individual pressure on a given genetic mutation, let alone the combined effect of multiple pressures that are constantly changing.
A species that is the “most fit” this year (because it “survived”) may suddenly become the least fit and go extinct, once the environment changes in some small way. There’s no way to predict what will actually happen to a given species, regardless of its mutations or its “fitness”, because such predictions are based on a static, pre-defined environment, something that does not exist in nature.
It is in this sense that selection is completely random. It is not driven by “survival of the fittest” (a tautology). It does not preserve any particular mutation (a “fit” species that thrives in one environment can be wiped out with the first change to that environment.)
As for the effect of gene mutation in actual living species, under controlled laboratory conditions…the results are convincing. Altering the genetic information of a perfectly good animal consistently produces diseased and freakish offspring that make the animal less fit, not more.
There is no getting past the following fact: If you monkey with any amount of intelligent information–a book, a computer code, a DNA string–you will ultimately destroy the information and the viability of that information. You will never create a completely new and useful body of information.
Except this example has absolutely flat nothing to do with evolution. You are arguing against evolution happening through the mutation of a single individual and (shockingly!) come to the conclusion it wouldn’t. We agree. Now can we talk about evolution?
In evolution variation happens within a population, and offspring have given chance to carry a mutation. If the mutation is deleterious, they will be negatively selected (be less likely to reproduce), if it is positive, they will be positively selected (be more likely to reproduce) and if is neutral it will have no effect on their reproductive ability but will be passed on to their offspring. Simulating evolution on a computer? Unheard of? Hardly .
As for “selection is random”, this is so patently absurd that given the grammatically correct nature of your comment, I find it very hard to swallow that you actually believe what you are telling me. Conditions are so unpredictable that what favors one year is negative the next? On which Earth? So given the temperature at the North Pole you assert there would be no selective pressure for living beings to develop resistance to low temperatures because hey, you never know when it’ll be tropical in the tundra!
Oh c’mon, seriously? When did you last eat corn? How about rice? Note that these are just to basic parts of our diet that have been genetically modified by modern biotechnology. I’m hoping (though not praying
) that you are aware that animal husbandry and the development of agricultural crops by humans is also genetic modification, with a significant amount of mutant selection, but done before knowledge of how phenotypes related to genotypes.
[...] Mehta, primary author of The Friendly Atheist, has an interview with Comfort. It’s a good example of his [...]
PAJOHN that’s funny because Dawkins actually said “Yes” but Ray chickened out of the donation to the RDF.
Meanwhile, Matt Dillahunty, Aron Ra, Abbie Smith, et al, are all waiting just to get a response from Ray.
Ray sends out Press Releases when people who don’t want to debate him, don’t debate him. But he’s incredibly quiet when it comes to people who do want to debate him.
Claudia,
Thank you for your thoughtful response. Let’s review some of the points you mentioned…
Corn and rice can be modified. So can animals. But have you ever read about scientists changing corn into rice? Or rice into an animal? Even with intelligently directed variations, corn is still corn. Rice is still rice. And neither will ever become a cow.
Regarding mutations occurring in populations…an interesting concept. But resorting to “population evolution” will not solve the problem of [random mutation] x [random selection]. At best, it simply delays the inevitable downward spiral of genetic degradation produced by random mutations in individuals. (Again, try mutating any computer program and see what happens. As long as you do not introduce your own intelligence into the “selection” process, your program will ultimately crash. Even if you attempt “population evolution” by replicating numerous copies of the same program at each iteration. There is no computer program that demonstrates evolution without resorting to intelligent selection at some point.)
As for environments… Environments have numerous components (not simply temperature). Each one of these factors is constantly changing. And it is impossible to gauge the composite effect of these factors on the “fitness” of a given mutation. There are constant changes to these factors’ duration, intensity, and kind. Thus, no mutation is guaranteed to be preserved by “selection.” A mutation which makes the organism “fit” in a given environment could easily make it “neutral” or “unfit,” if the environment should change in the least. Environments are highly complex and they’re ALWAYS in flux.
Thus, there is no such thing as survival of the fittest. There is only survival of a particular organism in a particular (controlled and unchanging) environment. Once the environment changes, or the organism mutates (individual or population), all bets are off. The new circumstances of the environment and/or the organism may wipe out the new “species.” And even if it doesn’t do so immediately, the cumulative effects of random mutations will eventually doom the genetic sequence to a string of meaningless–and thus fatal–ACTGs.
Mr. C.,
Your last two posts show that you have no idea what you are talking about, to a point that it is almost comical.
First, your computer code example shows nothing but except that arguing evolution by analogy to computer code is exceedingly dumb. And false. Every person you’ve ever known (including yourself) has mutations in his or her genetic code. Most are neutral.
Second, your assertion that “survival of the fittest” is a tautology: big deal. It’s not an accurate description of natural selection, anyway, as the key element of reproduction is missing.
Third, your notion that selection is “random” because environmental pressures change is stupid. That merely shows that selective pressure changes, not that the selective pressure as a result of that environment is random. And the fact that, over time, this change will cause formerly fit species to be “unfit”: Congratulations. You’ve discovered one reason why 99% of the species that ever existed is extinct. This has been known for decades and decades.
Fourth, your amazement that corn is not turned into rice and that rice is not turned into animals… How stupid. Rice and corn diverged millions of years ago; plants and animals, billions of years ago. No one in his right mind (which excuses Ray Comfort) would expect to see such changes after a few decades, even of artificial selection.
Please read a book.
If Man was made in God’s image,then why aren’t humans invisible too?
David,
Humans are invisible. You see a person’s body. But you never actually see them–their mind and their spirit.
You can remove a person’s arms and legs. But that doesn’t decrease their personhood one bit, because the essence of a person is contained in his or her invisible nature (mind, spirit, consciousness).
MrC, It has already been explained to you that selection is not random. What you are describing is genetic drift. Genetic drift does not produce adaptation. Natural selection does. Also, natural selection does not prepare the next generation for the future. The next generation will be (based on which individuals leave the most fertile offspring, the only real measure of fitness) better adapted to live in its parents environment. If the environment changes faster than the species can adapt, they will go extinct. It happens all the time. Also, natural selection and survival of the fittest is not a tautology because there is evidence to support it. They do not stand alone, but supported by the breadth of modern science.
As for your corn is still corn, this isn’t correct. Teosinte is a different species than primitive maise, which is also a different species from modern corn. In fact, modern corn and teosinte look nothing alike.
Your computer code concept has already been pointed out to you to be false. Please google evolutionary algorithm.
Your population of cows offers an interesting thought exercise, should you be willing to think. Would we get modern canaries after a million years? No, but we might get something analagous to bats. Would we have whales? Not exactly, but it is certainly possible that we might get something similar. After all, we have excellent fossil and molecular evidence that the closest living relatives of the elephant are the pig-like hyrax and the manatee. Would you call these the same “kinds”?
Your question, as clever as you think it might be, really only betrays that you have refused to learn about biology and natural history. Ignorance may be bliss, but it not a virtue.
Dear Woody,
I appreciate your comments and your passion. Let’s consider your points.
ARGUING EVOLUTION BY COMPUTER CODE IS DUMB
I’m sure you’re aware there are many computer-based models and demonstrations of evolution created by scientists who support evolution. Certainly you don’t mean to call them dumb.
I’m simply critiquing the “selection” mechanism they use, because each of these computer models injects intelligent selection at some point in the process. The programs thereby fail to accurately model the theory of evolution and, in fact, prove that evolution cannot work without some measure of intelligent selection. If you find a computer model that succeeds in creating functioning code without the aid of intelligent selection, please let me know.
NATURAL SELECTION, SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, and REPRODUCTION
The theory of natural selection is driven by survival of the fittest. Thus, if “survival of the fittest” is a tautology, then natural selection must be an illusion.
Is this a big deal? Yes. Without survival of the fittest, Darwin’s theory falls apart. I have previously explained why “survival of the fittest” is a tautology, so I will say no more.
As for the element of reproduction… I’m guessing that you mean repeated iterations of natural selection will yield completely new and functioning organs, limbs, bio-processes, and species. But multiplying an illusion (natural selection through survival of the fittest) by 1000 will still yield an illusion.
RANDOM SELECTION v. CHANGES IN PRESSURES
The same randomness that causes unpredictable mutations in the genetic code also produces unpredictable changes in the environment (both micro and macro) with unpredicatble and often deleterious impact on the preservation of any previous mutation.
As a result of these random selection patterns, mutant gene pools that once appeared “fit” become “unfit” and rapidly go extinct. Thus, there is no overarching selection mechanism that inexorably drives species to higher levels. It’s all random. Certain mutants survive today. Tomorrow they die–along with their mutations that supposedly gave them more survivability.
TURNING CORN INTO RICE
You say that rice and corn diverged millions of years ago. This is a statement based on faith, since no witness was there to observe the event.
What we have seen in the laboratory is that there are limits beyond which variation cannot proceed without seriously degrading the organism. You may believe that corn and rice descended from some common ancestor, but you cannot demonstrate it. What you are saying is based on faith, not observational science.
As for whether 12 billion years is enough time for evolution to produce the genetic code of a human being, the answer is no. If typed in 10-pt. font, the DNA of a man or woman would literally stretch from the North Pole to the Equator, about 6000 miles. If we use the known rates of the occurrence of “beneficial” mutations, and the known rates of inheritance, and so on, there has not been enough time to produce a single strand of human DNA.
If you’re truly interested in studying these figures, I recommend “Not By Chance,” by Dr. Lee Spetner.
Regards!
Robster,
Very interesting comments. Let’s address some of them.
NATURAL SELECTION PRODUCES ADAPTATION
This is not what evolution says. Evolution says that random mutations produce physical changes in the organism. It is these changes that make it more adaptable. Natural selection simply preserves the adaptations in the individual (or the population.)
Also, you acknowledge that mutant species go extinct all the time. I agree. But the thing you’re missing is that environmental pressures have no direction (they’re random). In a given scenario, certain pressures may “select” certain mutations for preservation. In another setting, those same pressures may eliminate the mutation. Or they may adversely affect another “beneficial” mutation. Bottom line: there is no direction, no overall upward selection. If anything, the predominant direction is downward. As you say 99% of species have gone extinct.
EVOLUTIONARY ALGORITHMS
I did as you suggested and googled the above phrase. The Wikipedia article that came up begins with this:
“In artificial intelligence, an evolutionary algorithm (EA) is a subset of evolutionary computation…”
Apparently, evolutionay algorithms require artificial intelligence (AI). AI is a complex set of instructions that is programmed into a computer by an intelligent programmer. The “selection function” which drives these sorts of programs is not “natural.” It is designed by an intelligent programmer, who installs a list of pre-determined criteria to achieve a desired outcome. This is not an accurate model of evolution.
COWS, CORN, BATS, AND WHALES
You apparently support evolution, but you seem to have trouble accepting its logical conclusions. If the theory of evolution is correct, then why can’t a cow turn into a whale? Why can’t corn turn into a bat or a canarie? (And is this what you really believe happened? That some bacteria eventually morphed into a beautiful man or woman?)
FINALLY
Aside from the problems of “survival of the fittest” and “natural selection,” there are also the problems of chirality, convergence, probability theory, information theory, and so on. Evolution just doesn’t work.
Cheers!
MrC, Reality does not need your consent to operate. Selection pressures are not random if you are living under them. Weather patterns, food sources, predators, etc, are not random, but are specific features of a habitat. A habitat is not a rain forest one day and a desert the next and a coral reef after that. They are continuous sets of potential pressures and ecological niches. I’m not sure why you persist in describing these as random.
Species tend to produce more offspring than will survive to reproduce. Organisms pass on heritable information, of which, there is variation within a population. Those variations that support survival to adulthood and reproduction will be preserved in the next generation, and if one variation is better than another in the current locality, it will be more common in the next generation. That is evolution. With enough reproductive cycles, small changes can become large changes, and one population can become different enough from another to prevent interbreeding. At this point, speciation occurs.
If all we had were some pretty turns of phrase, yes, it would be a tautology. But it isn’t. We have evidence. 150 years of evidence since Darwin. 200 if we go back to Lamark, Lyell, Bouffon and other naturalists who built the foundation on which Darwin, Bates and Wallace started evolutionary science as a field of biology.
So yes, over 3.5 billion years, prokaryotes evolved into both more prokaryotes and into eukaryotes including beautiful men and women along with ugly ones. You may find this disturbing. I find it exhilarating. It means that there is so much to learn, describe and study, as opposed to the thought that the height of human understanding of biology was reached by plagiarizing bronze age tribes a few thousand years ago.
Otherwise, why would we use the same genetic code? Why would the insulin gene of a beautiful woman or homely man, or even ignorant street preacher, when put into a bacterium, produce human insulin? Why would the gene that codes for the protein that makes a firefly glow, when put into a plant, leads to the production of the same protein and a glowing plant? Or is god just lazy? Are you calling god lazy? I’m sure that is just as bad as calling god non-existent.
Why would the same protein regulate translation in yeast, fruit flies and humans, along with everything in between? Why do similar proteins regulate the cell cycle in all eukaryotes?
Because we share a common ancestor, and whether you believe it or not, we all evolved from that common ancestor to endless forms most beautiful.
As for why animals don’t become plants? Animals would have to develop a symbiotic relationship with photosynthetic prokaryotes as endosymbiotes. This would require many hoops to be jumped through, all of which would be much easier for a single celled eukaryote to perform instead of a large multicellular one. Probability is against it. Also, while the plant-cow would be in the process of becoming more plant like, it would be a pretty lousy cow and a pretty lousy plant. It would be out-competed by already existing plants and already existing cows. It is very improbable, but not impossible.
It is much more likely for a plant to become fungus like, as the saprophytic orchids have done. They lost their chloroplasts and gain their nutrients entirely by absorbing decaying matter on the forest floor. You see, what you suggest is impossible is already happening! And I have already given you evidence that your concept of kinds doesn’t work. Land dwelling animals gave rise to piglike hyraxes, elephants and manatees! Your concept does not meet the standard of evidence and must be discarded.
But lets just say, for the purpose of argument that evolution was completely wrong (very unlikely in light of the evidence), that does not mean that creationism, or even your brand of christian creationism, is correct by default. Disproving Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection would not make creationism correct, but would mean that perhaps Lamark or some other naturalistic explanation was better. There is no reason to resort to supernaturalism when natural explanations are sufficient.
Evolution works, has worked and is continuing to work. A Gish gallop of claims that evolution does not explain chirality (if you mean amino acid chirality, it doesn’t actually need to. if you mean organismal chirality, it explains it beautifully), probability (fits nicely), information theory (this works as well, despite what creationists claim), and so on and so forth. You can say that it doesn’t, but you haven’t investigated it. You haven’t even done the work to find out if what people like Comfort, Ham, Behe and others tell you is correct. And it is so simple to do this. All that knowledge and discovery, but you prefer the iron and bronze age to the information age.
Robster FCD said,
“”scmike, Do you beat your slaves according to the bible’s directions? Require that your wife’s head be covered at the right times? Stone your children when they are disrespectful? Refuse to wear mixed fabrics? Play football with a regulation pigskin? Think it is right for small children to be killed by bears for laughing at a bald man? Do you believe that your god’s might is enough to defeat any nation as long as they do not have iron chariots? Either you accept and practice all parts of the bible or you aren’t really a Christian, right?”"
Hi Rob. I’m sure you won’t mind if I don’t take my Bible exegesis from you, no? I do appreciate, however, you helping to demonstrate the point that those who reject the authority of the Bible do so based on a built in bias and hostility against it and not for any valid intellectual reasons, as your gross misrepresentations of Scripture indicate.
“”This is the truth of your bible.”"
I wholeheartedly disagree, but you do raise a good question–how do you account for the existence of ‘truth’ (which is certain by definition) in a worldview which denies the God of the Bible?
“”It is the record of an often brutal group of tribes surrounded by often hostile neighbors, in a frightening world with earthquakes, fires and floods. It is how they explained the world around them through fables and tales, especially those that they borrowed from their Babylonian neighbors.”"
Problem is, you beg the question by assuming that the Bible is not inspired revelation from God. What is the basis for this assumption?
“”The problem is, we aren’t the bronze age culture of ancient Israel or the iron age world of Roman Jerusalem, but we live in an age of science and reason,”"
What you fail to realize is though, is that neither the validity of science or one’s reason can be accounted for apart from the God of the Bible. I’ll show you what I mean:
The foundation of science is induction which presupposes the uniformity of nature. On what grounds do you assume the uniformity of nature (i.e. the future will be like the past) ?
On what basis do you proceed with the assumption that your reasoning is valid? Or do you?
“”where questions and doubt should be welcomed, and when evidence based answers are given, you should gladly accept them after investigation, not continue to wallow in the ignorance of a bygone era.”"
Glad to see that you believe in the concept of evidence as well. Since evidence alludes to proof and proof of anything requires absolute laws of logic and reason as well as certainty, perhaps you’d be so kind as to tell how any of these things make sense in your worldview?
“”Ray Comfort knows that he is wrong.”"
No, you just BELIEVE he is. By the way, since you no doubt believe in evolution, how can anyone be ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in your worldview if our thoughts are just the byproducts of chemical reactions in our evolved brains? If evolution were true, each of us would only believe what we believe because our brain told us to, not because it is ‘right’ or ‘true’. In such a universe, it would be impossible to settle any conflict, in fact, there could be no ‘conflicts’ as right and wrong wouldn’t exist, only that which IS. The very fact that you are arguing as if you could change our minds reveals the inconsistency of your position.
“”He has been corrected over and over, has admitted that he was wrong, and continues to say the same wrong things. He is a professional liar, a liar with a cause.”"
Again, I wholeheartedly disagree with you, nevertheless is lying absolutely morally wrong in your worldview? If so, why?
“”If someone realizes that part of the bible is a faulty myth, they might begin to question the rest of it.”"
Perhaps you’d care to tell what standard of logic you use to call anything a ‘faulty myth’, how you account for that standard, and why it necessarily applies to anything in your worldview? I’m sure you’d agree that using logic to try and argue against the only possible source of logic is woefully self-refuting, no?
“”If the bible doesn’t fit the evidence, you really should admit that the evidence might not be wrong, but rather that the bible is in error.”"
Actually, it is only because the Bible is true that you can even make sense of that statement. I’ll be glad to show you what I mean when (if) you respond to my questions above. I look forward to your responses!
I would like to point out to y’all that tautologies are by definition true statements.
That they are cheap does not make them incorrect.
I would opine that “1 + 2 = 3″ isn’t a fallacious assertment.
Rationalist,
yeah, I typo’d at an inopportune moment
I’m not a Jesus-Myther (someone who believes that everything about Christ is a complete fabrication), but I don’t think the people respectively their accounts are as watertight as you think they are.
Josephus wrote about people who were around who believed that what they had heard about Christ was accurate, hence calling themselves Christians. However, the existence of people who believe something is obviously not equal to a verification of what they claim, especially not if it’s about miraculous occurences.
Tertullian wrote, from the viewpoint of being a Christian, that the very absurdity of the gospel accounts was reason to believe them – for who would claim such things if they weren’t true. He’s also quick to point a finger at heretics who call themselves Christians but don’t believe the resurrection in the flesh, and claims that the suffering and deaths of martyrs alone is evidence of the truth of their beliefs. I can’t by any reasonable measure call Tertullian an objective writer with any reliable standard of accuracy or truth. Much of what he wrote can only be verified by his reference to yet other sources like (probably, as proper citations were not usual procedure back then) Tacitus and/or Suetonius.
-Tertullian, On the Flesh of Christ
Justin Martyr was also an apologist, making many similar claims as Tertullian. These people are excellent sources to find out more about early Christianity, but they are not at all convincing when it comes to verifying the supernatural claims of Christianity themselves.
Mr. C.,
I am dismayed by your passion, because it shows, yet again, that the ignorance that is religion has destroyed another mind. (see the irrational idiocy in scmike’s 12/3 1:06 am post, for another example.)
COMPUTER CODE
Your “critique” is misplaced because these computer programs are only designed to model certain aspects of evolution. You, however, base your argument not on that which they are designed to model, but on other things, such as the “selection mechanism.” That is dumb.
NATURAL SELECTION, SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST, and REPRODUCTION
“The theory of natural selection is driven by survival of the fittest.” No, it isn’t. “survival of the fittest” was a phrase coined by Herbert Spencer in comparing his economic policies to natural selection. Nevertheless, that this description of evolution is a tautology does not mean that the concept being described is false, it just means that the rhetoric is ill-fitting. This is first-grade level reasoning, for Pete’s sake.
And as for reproduction, it is necessary because the “selection” in natural selection doesn’t just require surviving, but surviving and successful reproduction. Without the element of reproduction, any summary of natural selection is wrong.
RANDOM SELECTION v. CHANGES IN PRESSURES
This section here, you really do have no idea what you are talking about, because you assume that evolution must mean that there is a “inexorable drive” to “higher levels.” That’s dumb and about 100 years out of date. If you did any reading whatsoever in modern science, you might understand that.
When a group of organisms in a population which were previously “fit” are made “unfit” by a change in the environment, that is natural selection at work. Nature (“the environment”) had selected (in a rhetorical sense, as there is no intentionality at work) the remaining organisms by having the now “unfit” die or fail to reproduce. Those that are now “unfit” are not that way by luck of the random draw, but by the fact that in any given environment, some organism are better at avoiding the death or failure to reproduce than others, based on inherited characteristics. This is all elementary stuff.
That the environment changes from time to time doesn’t make natural selection random, but means that it is a dynamic process whereby the selection criteria change over time.
Please do some actual reading and empty your head of silly myths.
TURNING CORN INTO RICE
“You say that rice and corn diverged millions of years ago. This is a statement based on faith, since no witness was there to observe the event.”
LOL!! Wow. Going the ol’ “no witness” route, huh? Of all the lame arguments in the creationist quiver, this is the lamest. LOL. No, it isn’t based on faith (which is the most asinine way of thinking.) It is based on science. I could explain it to you in, but you’d just stick your fingers in your ears and say “blah, blah, blah” like a good little god-bot (don’t want learnin’ to interfere with the indoctrination…)
“What we have seen in the laboratory is that there are limits beyond which variation cannot proceed without seriously degrading the organism.”
No, we haven’t. What we’ve seen is that there are a lot of ways in which organisms can be made non-viable. That does not mean that there is an inherent limit beyond which variation cannot proceed. To use an analogy, if you were on a windy road and randomly steered the car, there are more ways that you could crash than that you could survive, but that does not mean that there is any inherent limit as to how far down the road you can go.
“You may believe that corn and rice descended from some common ancestor, but you cannot demonstrate it. What you are saying is based on faith, not observational science.”
LOL. Who feeds you this bullshit? The science which has established the relatedness of rice and corn is sound, based on observation and experimentation.
Lee Spetner???!!!?? LMAO. Wow. You really are scraping the bottom of the barrel. Why not bring up Jack Chick or Phillip Johnson. Spetner’s a nut, but at least he’s an honest nut in saying that he wrote his silly book as an attempt to salvage his dopey religion from the fact that science shows it to be mostly nonsense. He’s got one over those who lie for Jesus (pretty much every Xian, in my experience…)
Anyway, the error in this argument is that evolution does not occur by one strand of DNA mutating one mutation at a time in sequential order. Understand that simple concept and you see that Lee Spetner’s ideas are moronic. You really should be embarrassed by bringing that to the table. Lee Spetner…. LOL!!!
@scmike:
I actually wasn’t going to respond to you. My post wasn’t, exactly, up for debate. I was merely giving my ‘testimony.’
Yes, I was ’saved.’ I was baptized. I, for years, lived a good, Christian life; praying, reading the bible, studying its word.
About the time I started going to college, I started questioning the legitimacy of the bible. It was a good read, I will give you that much. I took from its words a lot of good, moral lessons. “Love your neighbor.” “Love your enemy.” “Don’t criticize a brother for a speck if you have a giant flogging log stuck in your eye.”
It’s a book, though. It’s a book that was written years ago, by scholars, by preachers, by kings. I do not think a single bit of the original text actually survives, today, in the bible you have on your living room coffee table.
What one thing legitimizes the bible over every other religious text in history? Why is the Koran wrong? Why is god so special? Why don’t people worship Zeus, Thor, or Osiris anymore? If all your answers to those questions are either: a) the bible says so, or b) god says so, then you have faith and not proof.
There is no proof in god. There is no proof that the bible is written by him. I am not going to go as far as to say there is no god, because I do not have proof of that, either. While there is no verifiable ‘proof’ in any scientific theory (one cannot legitimately say that evolution is truth,) there is at least enough testing and scientific progress to show that those are more likely true.
I do not deny faith is a powerful tool. I, for years, used it to mold myself into a proper, moral human being. Others do this without faith. In the end, though, it’s all me, and not god that defines my life and what I do with it.
Rob Bratcher “As I introspect the reasoning’s in this blog, only one thought infiltrates my cerebellum, “pretentious”.”
Saying to Ray or one of his followers “Your confidence that the Theory of Evolution is false greatly exceeds your knowledge of same” isn’t pretentious. It’s a fact. Crocoduck? C’mon!
“Without exception when a person of faith has a point of view that diverges from an Atheist, the Atheist invariably attacks the intellect of the person of faith.”
Pointing out that Ray Comfort is willfully ignorant isn’t attacking his intellect. It’s attacking the deliberate poor use of it. Pointing out that, even after he’s been corrected (repeatedly) on his, um, misknowledge that he continues to repeat the same story that that makes him no longer simply ignorant, but a liar isn’t even an “attack”. It’s a fact.
“Not all people of faith are deficient.”
Okay, but we’re talking about Ray and his followers here.
“However my recollection of discourse with Atheist has not been as favorable.”
Note: “Atheism” isn’t capitalized.
“People of faith have their ‘village idiots’ as do Atheist.”
There’s a major difference. We tend not to promote ours as experts.
scmike “Problem is Joan, the foundation of all science is induction which presupposes the uniformity of nature (i.e. the future will be like the past). What is your basis for expecting the future to be like the past?”
And what’s yours? (Keep in mind that if you were a Hindu or a Scientologist, you’d potentially be arguing that the universe was much older than it is.)
“One cannot reason TO the truth of the Bible if it is their ultimate standard, they MUST reason FROM it as their basis for interpreting the world around them, not vice versa.”
Phrase it as “interpretation” if you like, but you should realize that what you’re saying is that when the evidence of the universe and a book conflict, it’s the universe that’s wrong. That you have to misinterpret, ignore or mangle the evidence to make it fit the book should be a clue that you’re on the wrong path. That the sages of evolution-denial are (and have been for quite a while) lying to you should be another.
“As I am sure you have found, God does not ‘fit into evolution’ as Christianity and evolution are totally incompatible with one another.”
Except, of course, for the Christians that do reconcile them.
“In order to assume evolution to be true, one must reject the Biblical account of creation, and therefore the truth of the Bible.”
No. In order to “accept evolution” (and the many sciences that support it) one must take parts of Genesis as poetry and metaphor.
“The result, of course, is sheer absurdity and foolishness.”
Uh huh. Good luck with that.
Mr. C “I’m sure you’re aware there are many computer-based models and demonstrations of evolution created by scientists who support evolution. Certainly you don’t mean to call them dumb.”
I wouldn’t call them dumb. I’d call them “arguments from analogy”, which have limitations.
“I’m simply critiquing the “selection” mechanism they use, because each of these computer models injects intelligent selection at some point in the process.”
And that’s the limitation. When you’re programming a computer, you’re acting as the environment would in natural selection, but when people do it it’s artificial selection.
Computer simulations of evolution are greatly simplified models of it. Arguing as though the man behind the model falsified the actuality of the real thing is daft.
“The theory of natural selection is driven by survival of the fittest.”
Practically, it’s not survival of the fittest. It’s survival of the fit enough.
“Thus, if “survival of the fittest” is a tautology, then natural selection must be an illusion.”
Except that it’s not.
“You say that rice and corn diverged millions of years ago. This is a statement based on faith, since no witness was there to observe the event.”
Well, it sure is a good thing that they left behind evidence, or we’d be screwed, wouldn’t we? We can dig both with a shovel or with a gene sequencing thingy. And the best part is that they come to pretty similar conclusions.
“If you’re truly interested in studying these figures, I recommend “Not By Chance,” by Dr. Lee Spetner.”
Oh boy! Fun with math! Try googling for a review from the side that knows what the hell its talking about.
Kevin said,
“”I actually wasn’t going to respond to you.”"
Couldn’t help yourself, eh? The truth does have a way of drawing people in.
“”Yes, I was ’saved.’ I was baptized. I, for years, lived a good, Christian life; praying, reading the bible, studying its word.”"
You didn’t answer my question from the previous post. No problem, I’ll ask again: Did you know the Lord, Kevin?
“”About the time I started going to college, I started questioning the legitimacy of the bible. It was a good read, I will give you that much. I took from its words a lot of good, moral lessons. “Love your neighbor.” “Love your enemy.” “Don’t criticize a brother for a speck if you have a giant flogging log stuck in your eye.”
It’s a book, though. It’s a book that was written years ago, by scholars, by preachers, by kings. I do not think a single bit of the original text actually survives, today, in the bible you have on your living room coffee table.”"
And again Kevin, there’s your problem. A Christian is someone who, in complete submission to God, holds Him and His word to be their ultimate authority. You, on the other hand, hold your own autonomous ability to reason above God and the Bible. As I said before, one must reason FROM the truth of the Bible as their starting point, not TO it. Otherwise the Bible is not your ultimate authority, you are. Again, I sincerely recommend that you repent and trust in Jesus Christ while you still can.
“”What one thing legitimizes the bible over every other religious text in history? Why is the Koran wrong? Why is god so special?”"
Well, for starters, the Bible is the ONLY ‘Holy Book’ that makes sense of absolute, immaterial, universal entities such as laws of logic, etc., comports with reality, and is internally consistent.
Those who reject the truth of the Bible do so because of their presupposition (assumption) that it is NOT the Word of God, and therefore not true. The problem is, if that assumption were true, they would have no basis for logic, reason, knowledge, truth, and a whole host of other things that cannot be accounted for apart from the Bible. Trying to use logic and reason to argue against the ONLY possible source of logic and reason is woefully self-refuting and absurd. It’s kind of like someone denying the existence of air while breathing it. What would you think of such a person?
“”Why don’t people worship Zeus, Thor, or Osiris anymore?”"
What are you talking about? People profess belief in and worship all sorts of false gods as a means of suppressing the truth of God’s existence. Of course though, what people profess to believe has absolutely nothing to do with what is true. It is the Biblical position that God has revealed Himself to ALL people so that they can KNOW for certain who he is.
“”If all your answers to those questions are either: a) the bible says so, or b) god says so, then you have faith and not proof.”"
Unless of course, God has revealed Himself to us through the Bible so that we can know for certain who He is. Do you deny the possibility that an omnipotent, omniscient Being could do this?
“”There is no proof in god. There is no proof that the bible is written by him.”"
The very concept of ‘proof’ is proof of God’s existence and the truth of the Bible, as proof requires certainty and absolute laws of logic and reason. None of these things can be accounted for apart from the God of the Bible. If you dispute this, please tell me how you account for any of these concepts apart from God. How is it possible for you to prove anything in your worldview?
“”I am not going to go as far as to say there is no god, because I do not have proof of that, either.”"
You’ve already said it in declaring yourself to be your own ultimate authority.
Not very wise.
“”While there is no verifiable ‘proof’ in any scientific theory (one cannot legitimately say that evolution is truth,) there is at least enough testing and scientific progress to show that those are more likely true.”"
I agree with you that those who deny God must accept science (and a whole host of other things) on blind faith alone, as they have zero foundation for the scientific method, knowledge, or proof in their worldview. I also agree that those who accept evolution do so on blind faith and primarily by default since they reject the true Creator of the universe. Why trust such a hopeless and circular position, Kevin?
Note: Although there are some misguided Christians who believe in evolution, I would submit that they don’t truly understand either Christianity or evolution, as the two are completely incompatible with each other.
“”I do not deny faith is a powerful tool.”"
Of course not, as this is what you are now basing your entire life upon–blind faith.
I for one prefer the security of having certainty through God and His Word.
“”I, for years, used it to mold myself into a proper, moral human being.”"
Here is another inconsistency Kevin. Apart from God, one cannot know what a ‘proper, moral human being’ is. Evolution cannot give us morality (i.e. that which ’should’ be), it can only give us that which IS. Besides, didn’t terrorists and child molesters evolve too? How do you know that they didn’t evolve right and you didn’t evolve wrong?
“”In the end, though, it’s all me, and not god that defines my life and what I do with it.”"
I pray that you do not carry that attitude to your grave (or even into tomorrow, for that matter), as the consequences are eternal.
Dear Robster,
Thanks for your reply.
As you know, any given environment has numerous components, each of which can vary (in terms of intensity, duration, entry mechanism, presence, etc.) In addition, the slightest variation in any environmental component (pressure) has complex repercussions throughout the surrounding environment, with many unforeseen consequences. Thus, there’s no way to tell how a given change in any one of these factors will affect the survivability of a given mutant organism, UNLESS you hold all other factors perfectly constant–something which never happens in nature.
Consequently, since there is no way to predict which pressures will change, or by how much, or in what direction, or to what cumulative effect on the rest of the environment and other species, there is no way to predict what mutations in a species will be preserved and which will be eliminated by these pressures. Some species will be eliminated by a change in temperature, or available diet, or predator presence. Others will not. In a complex, symbiotic, interdependent, multi-faceted environment, there’s no way to tell which species are going to survive until after the fact. (That’s why the appearance of certain species in hostile environments constantly surprises scientists.) If you cannot predict when and how these pressures will occur, and if you cannot predict whether the cumulative effect of these pressures will permit a given mutation to survive, then that which you call “natural selection” is random.
What we are left with is:
A) Pressures that MIGHT eliminate the mutant organism(s), or
B) Pressures that MIGHT have no effect on the mutant organism’s survivability (ability to reproduce in comparison to competing organisms), or
C) Pressures that MIGHT give the mutant organism an advantage in terms of its survivability (ability to reproduce…)
In other words, evolution postulates the theory that [random mutations] x [random selection] = new species.
Since the above equation cannot work, those who believe in evolution are compelled to ignore the fact that selection is completely random. Instead, they concentrate on the fact that some pressures actually favor a given mutation. What they forget is that the next change in the environment can–and often does–eliminate the mutant gene that supposedly gave the organism more “fitness.”
Thus, the survivability of a given mutation, over the long term, is completely unpredictable, and the mutation is usually eliminated. Meanwhile, the organism is accumulating more and more mutations which negatively affect its acute survivability. (Think of all the inherited diseases in man that, sadly, destroy the health and survivability of their victims.)
On a different note, you seem to equate variation with mutation. Evolution has nothing to do with existing (but recessive) DNA sequences (traits) becoming dominant; evolution is based on mutating the DNA sequence itself, i.e., introducing changes from outside the DNA, to alter, rearrange, add to, or subtract from the sequence.
As for the ability of human DNA to be replicated by a bacterium, and the commonality of certain portions of DNA among disparate organisms, I don’t see any reason to conclude that it means we all share a common ancestor. It could also mean that evolution occurred simultaneously in several places, and that these isolated events just happened to produce identical cell structures and mechanisms. Or it could mean that an intelligent and efficient Creator used the same tools and methods to create all forms of life.
Regarding the saprophytic orchids you mentioned, they have not become a fungus. They merely obtain most of their nutrients from the fungus that exists in their roots. This is an example of the innate ability of a species to adapt, not the mutation of one species into another. The plant is still an orchid.
As for information theory… It is easy to demonstrate that introducing mutations into a perfectly good sequence of ACTGs cannot work. Take any full page of meaningful text (the practical equivalent of DNA) and introduce random changes. Add, subtract, re-arrange, duplicate, or reverse any letter, word, sentence, punctuation mark, space, or group thereof. If the text still makes sense, keep it and make 10B copies. Now take those 10B copies and introduce more random changes. Survey the results and keep only those which still make sense. Repeat. I can assure you on the basis of mathematics, probability, and information theory that you will never produce a new and meaningful page of text from this experiment. Similarly, evolution cannot produce new species from random mutations inserted into a perfectly good DNA sequence.
Parenthetically, much of your response depends on the “That’s the way it is because I say so” technique. If you’re going to claim that information theory permits evolution to work, or that natural selection is not random, it would help if you could explain exactly HOW information theory permits this, and HOW pressures which are, by nature, unpredictable, cannot be random.
Regards!
Dear Woody,
Your arguments would be a lot more effective if you would stop resorting to name calling, and instead provide rational discussion of exactly HOW my statements are incorrect, and HOW your statements are correct.
COMPUTER CODES
It was Robster who suggested I consider EAs as an example of digital models of evolution. I merely pointed out that the critical function of selection–you do understand that evolution absolutely depends on this?–is always designed by an intelligent programmer who commands it to select for pre-determined characteristics. Without intelligent design, these programs cannot perform their intended functions. Hence, they don’t prove evolution, they disprove it.
NATURAL SELECTION AND REPRODUCTION
I am not denying that reproduction is essential to the success of natural selection (at least, according to the theory). What I’m saying is that reproduction of the mutation in subsequent generations–even it’s 10,000 generations–does not rescue evolution from the fact that [random mutations] x [random selection] cannot produce new species.
RANDOM SELECTION v. CHANGES IN PRESSURES
See post to Robster above.
CORN & RICE
Again, arguments based on emotion and name calling are not effective. Nor do they deserve a thoughtful response. They do, however, reveal a certain weakness in one’s position, and in one’s character.
Best!
Mr C wrote: “Thus, there’s no way to tell how a given change in any one of these factors will affect the survivability of a given mutant organism, UNLESS you hold all other factors perfectly constant–something which never happens in nature.”
What does that even mean? So what? Yes there are many factors which lead to the survivability of a species, how is this a problem for evolution?
Mr C continues: “Consequently, since there is no way to predict which pressures will change, or by how much, or in what direction, or to what cumulative effect on the rest of the environment and other species, there is no way to predict what mutations in a species will be preserved and which will be eliminated by these pressures.”
Again – so what? You are not providing anything remotely close to a flaw in the ToE.
And finally: “if you cannot predict whether the cumulative effect of these pressures will permit a given mutation to survive, then that which you call ‘natural selection’ is random.”
You have a seriously warped definition for “random” I’m afraid. To be random you claim you have to be able to predict the future?
You have, in several posts now, shown beyond all doubt that you have no idea what “random” means, and have no idea how natural selection works.
I think people like Ray Comfort are best ignored, not given special attention and allowed to plead their case on blogs. All he wants is media exposure, and you’re playing right into his hands by giving him a forum to air his views. I don’t pretend that these sorts of fringe beliefs are going to go away anytime soon, but perhaps they will disappear faster if the scientific and rational communities simply ignore them. What possible purpose can this interview serve? It just makes Ray Comfort feel important and lets him continue to believe that he has important things to say.
@scmike:
In trying to respond to your question, I was given two thoughts.
One) You argue the following, “god is real because the bible is real. The bible is correct because it’s the word of god.” If I do not believe the bible is the real word of god (I don’t) then, by consequence, I do not believe it is correct, and thus by reasoning, I do not believe god is real.
I suppose you’re right, I may never have known ‘the lord.’ I may have been giving the church lip service for however many years as a teenager / young adult because my family went there. However, as I am now an adult of my own responsibilities, I do not believe in god.
Two) You argue that morality, law, and reason cannot be found apart from god. If you think that is the case, then do you argue that if there was no god, then you would be a murderer / rapist / pedophile?
I do not understand enough about the nuances of evolution to explain how society came up with morals, laws, and logical ideas – I am not a biologist. I know apart from god, though – even possibly never have truly been a Christian – I continue to live a moral life to the words of the very same book you argue is reality.
Also, and apologies for the dual post:
“Repent or go to Hell” is not a way to win someone over to your side.
Modusoperandi,
I said: “Problem is Joan, the foundation of all science is induction which presupposes the uniformity of nature (i.e. the future will be like the past). What is your basis for expecting the future to be like the past?”
You replied: “”And what’s yours? (Keep in mind that if you were a Hindu or a Scientologist, you’d potentially be arguing that the universe was much older than it is.)”"
You seem to be forgetting that I asked first. Nevertheless I will answer your question. As a Christian, I can proceed with the assumption that nature will be uniform based on the promises of God. Now, your turn.
I said: “One cannot reason TO the truth of the Bible if it is their ultimate standard, they MUST reason FROM it as their basis for interpreting the world around them, not vice versa.”
You replied: “”Phrase it as “interpretation” if you like, but you should realize that what you’re saying is that when the evidence of the universe and a book conflict, it’s the universe that’s wrong.”"
What you fail to realize is that ALL evidence will be interpreted via our respective presuppositions. I presuppose that God exists and that the Bible is true, while you do not. The problem is, apart from the Bible, one cannot account for the validity of their senses and reasoning by which they observe any evidence or even account for the validity of the concept of evidence itself. Evidence alludes to the concept of proof, which requires absolute laws of logic, truth, and knowledge; none of which can be accounted for apart from the God of the Bible. If you dispute this, I challenge you to tell how you account for any of these things in your worldview.
“”That you have to misinterpret, ignore or mangle the evidence to make it fit the book should be a clue that you’re on the wrong path.”"
I disagree with your baseless accusation, but one thing is for certain, you believe in an absolute standard of truth by which to determine ‘right’ and ‘wrong’. What is that standard and how do you account for it?
“”That the sages of evolution-denial are (and have been for quite a while) lying to you should be another.”"
If evolution were true, you couldn’t even make sense of that statement. After all, what is a ‘lie’ in an evolutionary universe?
I said: “As I am sure you have found, God does not ‘fit into evolution’ as Christianity and evolution are totally incompatible with one another.”
You replied: “”Except, of course, for the Christians that do reconcile them.”"
Although some misguided Christians do accept evolution, I would argue that they don’t understand either Christianity or evolution, as the two are not compatible in the least.
I said: “In order to assume evolution to be true, one must reject the Biblical account of creation, and therefore the truth of the Bible.”
You said: “”No. In order to “accept evolution” (and the many sciences that support it) one must take parts of Genesis as poetry and metaphor.”"
Which they clearly are not meant to be taken as. Again, it is worth noting that this is why Christians should not take their Bible exegesis from those who deny the authority of Scripture. Too many misrepresentations.
I said: “The result, of course, is sheer absurdity and foolishness.”
You said: “”Uh huh. Good luck with that.”"
Nice argument. See what I mean!
scmike wrote: “What is your basis for expecting the future to be like the past?”
The fact that it has historically been this way. The fact that water can be used to extinguish certain flames is an apt example. Water has always, with %100 accuracy, been able to extinguish wood fires. I can make the assumption, with pretty solid evidence, that water will continue to behave this way in the future.
The bible/god didn’t factor into it.
Kevin said,
“”In trying to respond to your question, I was given two thoughts.
One) You argue the following, “god is real because the bible is real.”"
No. I am arguing that God is real AND the Bible is true by the impossibility of the contrary. The Bible is just one of the means that God has used to reveal Himself to us so that we can know for certain who He is and what He expects from us with regards to morality, logic, reason, and salvation through Jesus Christ.
“”I suppose you’re right, I may never have known ‘the lord.’ I may have been giving the church lip service for however many years as a teenager / young adult because my family went there.”"
Kevin, despite our differences, I want to thank you for your honesty in admitting this, as this is the crux of the issue at hand.
“”However, as I am now an adult of my own responsibilities, I do not believe in god.”"
As I have said before, it is my position that you KNOW that God exists, you simply choose to suppress this truth to avoid accountability to Him. I pray that will change.
“”Two) You argue that morality, law, and reason cannot be found apart from god. If you think that is the case, then do you argue that if there was no god, then you would be a murderer / rapist / pedophile?”"
That is not my argument, but so what if I was? If evolution were true, you could never call any of these things ‘wrong’. They may be against your personal preference, but so what? Why should anyone care about your personal preference, least of all the person whose personal preference it is to murder/rape/molest you?
You see Kevin I can say that all of the above are ABSOLUTELY morally wrong in my worldview, while you can’t. You are forced to admit that if enough people in society deemed any of the above evils as ‘acceptable’, then each of them could be ‘right’ according to your worldview (although I’m sure you’d feel differently if any of these acts were committed against you or a member of your own family).
“”I do not understand enough about the nuances of evolution to explain how society came up with morals, laws, and logical ideas – I am not a biologist.”"
Society didn’t come up with them. The laws of logic and morality are prescribed by God upon his creation as the standards by which He intends for us to think, reason, and behave. Take the logical law of non-contradiction for example. This law states that something CANNOT be true and not true at the same time and in the same way. Without this law, it would be impossible to make sense of anything or to ever know anything. If it is your position that men invented this law, let me ask you this–do you believe that the universe could have existed and not existed at the same time and in the same way BEFORE men created the law of non-contradiction?
“”I know apart from god, though – even possibly never have truly been a Christian – I continue to live a moral life to the words of the very same book you argue is reality.”"
That’s exactly my point Kevin. In order to appeal to any standard of morality or truth, you must first assume the truth of the Bible, yet you deny it’s truth in the same breath. Surely you can see the problem with THAT, no?
If you doubt what I’m saying, here’s a test for you. Tell me one thing you know for certain apart from God and how you claim to know it. Take care.
scmike asks: “Tell me one thing you know for certain apart from God and how you claim to know it.”
How about my water/fire example from my previous comment?
Kevin,
“”Also, and apologies for the dual post:
“Repent or go to Hell” is not a way to win someone over to your side.”"
If this is directed at me, please show me where I have said this.
Just for clarification, I am not interested in ‘winning anyone over to my side’. My job is to simply present the truth. What you or anyone else chooses to do with it is up to you, as I know that truth does not always equal persuasion. You can’t convince those who do not want to be convinced.
Mr. C.,
I’m not “resorting” to name-calling, I’m just doing it for fun. Further, I could provide ‘rational discussion” from now to next Tuesday, but would it do any good? You STILL refuse to understand why your notion that “selection is random” is wrong, even though it’s been explained to you in “rational discussion” a number of times.
COMPUTER CODES
The reason why your arguments are wrong and your conclusion that “they don’t prove evolution, they disprove it” is dopey is because these codes are not modeling the selection agent in nature, so any argument that is based on showing that the selection agent in the program is an intelligence, is asinine.
NATURAL SELECTION AND REPRODUCTION
Again, what is idiotic in your arguments in your idea that selection is random. It isn’t. If there is a strong selective agent for tallness in a certain animal, and, over the generations, the gene pool of a population of this animal becomes more and more dominated by alleles that produce morphological changes resulting in taller animals, due to the less successful reproduction of shorter animals, that is not random. The shorter animals were not unsuccessful at breeding at random, but because their genes did not contain alleles which produced the tallness that successful reproduction required. That is evolution by natural selection, with the selection (i.e., the more successful reproduction) based on the specific characteristic of tallness. That’s it. Nothing more. That’s all the statement “selection is not random” means.
RANDOM SELECTION v. CHANGES IN PRESSURES
In your post to Robster, you say:
“If you cannot predict when and how these pressures will occur, and if you cannot predict whether the cumulative effect of these pressures will permit a given mutation to survive, then that which you call ‘natural selection’ is random.”
This is the nut of your problem. What you are describing here is not selection. What you are saying is that there is no pattern to the history of life; that evolution has no inherent directionality. And that is correct as far as it goes, but not because “natural selection is random.” That’s just a stupid statement. The history of life does not equal the process of natural selection. Natural selection is not random because the alleles which survive do so because they provide an advantage in reproductive success other alternate alleles. The history of life has no directionality because it is a historically contingent process and the factors which generate mutation and which affect selective pressure are random, even though selection, itself, is non-random.
CORN & RICE
“Again, arguments based on emotion and name calling are not effective.”
When reason is repeatedly rejected in favor of bronze-aged superstition, sometimes name calling is the only answer left.
“They do, however, reveal a certain weakness in one’s position, and in one’s character.” LOL. I’m sure you believed it when you mommy told you that “all bullies are really scared”, too.
I mean, seriously. You argue, “You weren’t there to witness it, so how do you know?” and cite to Lee Spetner and you then complain that I made fun of those things??? What on earth did you expect when you bring that nonsense to the argument. It’s like showing up in the Supreme Court in a clown costume, complete with floppy shoes and grease paint, and being shocked that the Justices don’t take you seriously.
scmike wrote: “it is my position that you KNOW that God exists, you simply choose to suppress this truth to avoid accountability to Him.”
This always kills me… this is so illogical (I know, without god logic doesn’t exist
) that I wonder if theists ~really~ believe it!
So, your contention is that Kevin “KNOW”s god exists but chooses to supress this knowledge to avoid accountability to him? But if Kevin KNOWS god exists then surely he KNOWS that you cannot “avoid accountability” right? What kind of a god would allow it’s peons to “avoid accountability to him”? If Kevin knew god existed would he not also know that he’ll answer to him in the afterlife? Doesn’t that come with it?
It’s like when a theist says I should just let jesus into my heart – like I’ve “chosen” to be atheist! It’s not a “choice” people – I can’t just decide to believe something I find utterly unbelievable at the snap of my fingers!
joe agnost,
I asked: “What is your basis for expecting the future to be like the past?”
You answered: “”The fact that it has historically been this way.”"
Problem is, saying that the future WILL be like the past because it HAS BEEN like the past is a viciously circular argument and boils down to blind faith (not to mention that apart from God, one cannot account for the validity of the senses and reasoning they use to make any observation—I’ll show you what I mean).
“”The fact that water can be used to extinguish certain flames is an apt example.”"
How do you know that the senses and reasoning with which you have observed this are reliable?
“”Water has always, with %100 accuracy, been able to extinguish wood fires.”"
Is that absolutely true? How do you know?
You see, the most you could ever say, Joe, (if I granted you the validity of your senses and reasoning, which I don’t) is that based on your limited observations, it HAS been the case in the past that water has been able to extinguish wood fires.
The moment you try to project this into the future, you enter into the realm of blind faith. As you have admitted, you have no logical justification for expecting the future to be like the past in your worldview. I am pleased with that.
“”I can make the assumption, with pretty solid evidence, that water will continue to behave this way in the future.”"
Since when are viciously circular arguments considered ’solid evidence’? According to that logic, I could just argue that God exists because He exists and that would constitute solid evidence that it is so (although I doubt anyone here would let me by with that one).
“”The bible/god didn’t factor into it.”"
Perhaps we can see about that when you post your responses to the above questions.
scmike “As a Christian, I can proceed with the assumption that nature will be uniform based on the promises of God. Now, your turn.”
Hardly. All you can do is hope that neither God nor Satan are interfering in any way, which is the same thing real scientists do, and the kind of thing that the biblical tale broke with remarkable regularity.
“What you fail to realize is that ALL evidence will be interpreted via our respective presuppositions.”
“Things tend to appear to be what they are” is a presupposition? No, it’s a general rule that, at least above the subatomic scale, work pretty well.
“The problem is, apart from the Bible, one cannot account for the validity of their senses and reasoning by which they observe any evidence or even account for the validity of the concept of evidence itself.”
I can disbelieve that my eyes are telling me that there are stairs in front of me all I want, but that won’t save my rump from the ensuing stair-tumbled bruising.
My senses aren’t perfect. When I close my eyes in the dark I see sparkles that aren’t there. Still, eyes have been pretty good at helping our ancestors not be eaten by lions (not perfectly, of course, as lions’ eyes help it get lunch).
“Evidence alludes to the concept of proof, which requires absolute laws of logic, truth, and knowledge; none of which can be accounted for apart from the God of the Bible.”
Oh boy! A Presuppositionalist. Perhaps you’d be better served talking to a philosopher than me. I can barely even tie my shoes in the morning. The afternoon, too. It’s hard enough debating philosophy with philosophers, much less ones that declare the supernatural axiomatic.
“If you dispute this, I challenge you to tell how you account for any of these things in your worldview.”
Reality works. Shit happens.
“I disagree with your baseless accusation…”
You do realize that you’re on a page about Ray Comfort, right?
“…but one thing is for certain, you believe in an absolute standard of truth by which to determine ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.”
Moral right and wrong? Nope (I can’t discount the possibility, but even then I’d lean towards an ethical branch like Utilitarianism over Special Revelation). Neither do you. That’s why you don’t own slaves…now
What is your absolute standard for right and wrong? It can’t be God. That would put Him on the horns of Euthyphro’s Dilemma. That you don’t own slaves is, again, another indicator that it isn’t from Him, as He’s a fan and, even if you reinterpret NT passages to make Him be against it, it still leaves you stuck because being unchanging, He doesn’t change, and being perfect, He’s perfect, meaning that a perfect and unchanging center of absolute, unchanging morality commanded things that were, by His own absolute and unchanging standard, absolutely immoral. Further, if you’re under the spell of Divine Command Theory umbrella, that makes “absolute morality” relative and arbitrary, as it’s whatever God says it is at the time.
Man is messy. Denying that mess by appealing to the writings of other people whose work is credited to a posited 3-O’d God doesn’t help. It just enshrines their messiness permanently, which requires reinterpretation to make its permanent mess fit with the mess of the day. Again, this is why you don’t own slaves.
“What is that standard and how do you account for it?”
If you aren’t talking about moral right and wrong (which would fall under Moral Philosophy) but rather “is” and “is not”, then scientific investigation is the single best tool we have for the latter. It’s not great at “is”, as its “is” is “a close enough model, for now, based on the data so far, pending an updated model or a new model entirely with new data”, but it’s fabulous on slowly and methodically weeding out “is not”.
“If evolution were true, you couldn’t even make sense of that statement. After all, what is a ‘lie’ in an evolutionary universe?”
A and not-A. If I say a square is a circle, knowing that it’s not, then by definition I’m a liar. Ray says that not only is his square a circle, but those nasty scientists say that it’s really an apple and, when he’s corrected, he says the same thing.
“Although some misguided Christians do accept evolution, I would argue that they don’t understand either Christianity or evolution, as the two are not compatible in the least.”
And they’d say the same thing about you. Kudos for sticking with the losing side of progress.
“Which they clearly are not meant to be taken as.”
Clearly. Your exegesis is superior to theirs. Also, your Holy Spirit is guiding you, while they’re only listening to the buzz of whatever in their hearts. You’re right and everybody else is wrong. You’re right, not because you’re actually correct, but because Theology is the only science where you’re never wrong.
“Again, it is worth noting that this is why Christians should not take their Bible exegesis from those who deny the authority of Scripture. Too many misrepresentations.”
I know, right? I mean, even most of the early members of the Enlightenment (and shortly before) thought that they were good Christians while they were looking at the evidence of the real world and they thought that they were figuring out His handiwork. Outrage! I, personally, can’t believe that believers like Linnaeus actually believed that God would order life as though the soon to be realized Theory of Evolution were true! And don’t even get me started on that bastard of a so-called “believer” Charles Lyell! “Things must be much older than we thought” indeed! Pah!
“Nice argument. See what I mean!”
Hey, you’re the one who, I assume, argues for a literal worldwide Flood on or around 2348BC that resulted in a geologic column that only works if, say, hydrodynamic sorting didn’t exist back then (if it did, the big, heavy things would be at the bottom), half-life worked radically differently than it does now (while still leaving evidence as though it didn’t) and, oddly, that flowering plants were better at outrunning a flood than the (to the reality-based community) earlier plants (while simultaneously growing in soil underwater during it) and you don’t mind the “Flood canopy” resulting in a pre-Deluge Earth having Venus-like temperature and pressure. And that’s just for starters. You aren’t against just the Theory of Evolution, you’re standing against all science. And if you aren’t arguing for that Flood, then why don’t you take that part literally?
joe agnost,
I said: “Tell me one thing you know for certain apart from God and how you claim to know it.”
You said: “”How about my water/fire example from my previous comment?”"
You forgot to tell HOW you know it. Well?
joe agnost,
I said: “it is my position that you KNOW that God exists, you simply choose to suppress this truth to avoid accountability to Him.”
You said: “”This always kills me…”"
I hope not for your sake. That would be very bad news for someone in your condition.
“”this is so illogical (I know, without god logic doesn’t exist ) that I wonder if theists ~really~ believe it!”"
Nope. They know it for certain (as do you).
“”So, your contention is that Kevin “KNOW”s god exists but chooses to supress this knowledge to avoid accountability to him?”"
Not just Kevin, but all who deny the God of the Bible.
“”But if Kevin KNOWS god exists then surely he KNOWS that you cannot “avoid accountability” right?”"
No doubt this is why the Bible refers to those who deny God as ‘fools’.
(Note: This is not name-calling, but a right description of those who deny God despite KNOWING He exists.)
“”If Kevin knew god existed would he not also know that he’ll answer to him in the afterlife? Doesn’t that come with it?”"
Perhaps you can tell us, since you seem to be sharing his delusion?
“”It’s like when a theist says I should just let jesus into my heart – like I’ve “chosen” to be atheist! It’s not a “choice” people”"
One either lives their life in submission to God, or they don’t. For whatever reason, you choose not to. However, you do so despite KNOWING better. If you’ll answer my previous question regarding certainty in full, you’ll see what I mean.
“”I can’t just decide to believe something I find utterly unbelievable at the snap of my fingers!”"
While I do care about your beliefs Joe, for the sake of this discussion I am only interested in what you know and how you know it.
scmike wrote: “Not just Kevin, but all who deny the God of the Bible.”
So all of those really devout muslims (who pray 5 times a day, make the trek to Mecca, fast through Ramadan, etc.) know in their hearts that they’re wrong?
I understand why you might (incorrectly) think atheists “KNOW” god exists, but why would the muslims spend so much time and energy appeasing a god they “KNOW” doesn’t exist? It doesn’t make sense (even from a creationist!)
scmike “You see Kevin I can say that all of the above are ABSOLUTELY morally wrong in my worldview, while you can’t.”
Ahem
“(although I’m sure you’d feel differently if any of these acts were committed against you or a member of your own family).”
Well, you’re partway to a humanist system of morality…it’s remarkable what a little empathy can do.
“This law states that something CANNOT be true and not true at the same time and in the same way. Without this law, it would be impossible to make sense of anything or to ever know anything. If it is your position that men invented this law, let me ask you this–do you believe that the universe could have existed and not existed at the same time and in the same way BEFORE men created the law of non-contradiction?”
First of all, Laws reflect the universe. They’re descriptive. Secondly, false dicotomy; God declared it, Man “invented” it, it simply is.
”If this is directed at me, please show me where I have said this.“
“I pray that you do not carry that attitude to your grave (or even into tomorrow, for that matter), as the consequences are eternal.”
”Not just Kevin, but all who deny the God of the Bible.”
So, is that why General Revelation alone always results in the wrong answer? (that answer, historically speaking, being a bunch of spirits/gods)
[...] Friendly Atheist interview w/ Ray Comfort, Westboro Baptist Church, and Don’t Feed the Troll (thanks @ZenMonkey) [...]
Bathtub – The challenge was 10K direct to Dawkins, he refused saying he gets more than that for his lectures. Then Dawkins said tell him if he gives 100K to my charity (Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science)he’d do it. I believe he used his Personal Charity as a means of blocking an actual chance of getting it done because Ray probably wouldn’t want to put $ into such a charity). Ray offered Dawkins(not his charity) 20K and Dawkins said no again. Undoubtedly he refuses to debate out of fear of the absolute smack down he and every evolutionists would get in such a publically viewed debate.
Hey HBO … PPV ratings would be off the hook … get these guys to agree and split the PPV $$ for a charity of each ones choice. I am sure it would exceed Dawkins 100K request, however he will weasel out of this one as well.
God Bless you Ray!!!
Modusoperandi,
I said: “As a Christian, I can proceed with the assumption that nature will be uniform based on the promises of God. Now, your turn.”
You said: “”Hardly. All you can do is hope that neither God nor Satan are interfering in any way, which is the same thing real scientists do, and the kind of thing that the biblical tale broke with remarkable regularity.”"
Tell you what, why don’t you provide your contrary claim as to why you expect nature to be uniform and let’s compare. If I am going to answer your questions, the least you can do is respond in kind.
I said: “What you fail to realize is that ALL evidence will be interpreted via our respective presuppositions.”
You said: “”Things tend to appear to be what they are” is a presupposition?”"
Yep. You must presuppose that the senses and reasoning with which you observe ‘things’ are themselves reliable. What is your basis for this assumption?
“”No, it’s a general rule that, at least above the subatomic scale, work pretty well”"
Not that I grant you the validity of your senses and reasoning, but how do you know it ‘works’? To what end does it ‘work’?
I said: “The problem is, apart from the Bible, one cannot account for the validity of their senses and reasoning by which they observe any evidence or even account for the validity of the concept of evidence itself.”
You said: “”I can disbelieve that my eyes are telling me that there are stairs in front of me all I want, but that won’t save my rump from the ensuing stair-tumbled bruising.”"
True, but I want to know what basis you have for assuming that your senses and reasoning are reliable at all.
“”My senses aren’t perfect. When I close my eyes in the dark I see sparkles that aren’t there. Still, eyes have been pretty good at helping our ancestors not be eaten by lions (not perfectly, of course, as lions’ eyes help it get lunch).”"
I don’t doubt that our senses are helpful, as I know they are a wonderful gift from God. I want to know on what basis you proceed with the assumption that your senses and the reasoning with which you interpret them are reliable. So far, no dice.
I said: “Evidence alludes to the concept of proof, which requires absolute laws of logic, truth, and knowledge; none of which can be accounted for apart from the God of the Bible.”
You said: “”Oh boy! A Presuppositionalist.”"
Took you that long, huh?
“”Perhaps you’d be better served talking to a philosopher than me.”"
Only if you can find one who actually cares to answer my questions.
I said: “If you dispute this, I challenge you to tell how you account for any of these things in your worldview.”
You said: “”Reality works. S–t happens.”"
I’m sure you’d agree though, that if you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable, then you certainly can’t know what reality is or that your observation of it are valid. Priceless!
I said: “…but one thing is for certain, you believe in an absolute standard of truth by which to determine ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.”
You said: “”Moral right and wrong? Nope (I can’t discount the possibility, but even then I’d lean towards an ethical branch like Utilitarianism over Special Revelation). Neither do you. That’s why you don’t own slaves…now”"
Nor am I an Israelite living under a Theocracy. What’s your point?
(I do appreciate your admission, though, that slavery is NOT absolutely morally wrong in your worldview. Nice.)
“”What is your absolute standard for right and wrong? It can’t be God.”"
‘Can’t be God’, eh? Ever? Looks like you DO hold an absolute standard after all (knew it).
“”That would put Him on the horns of Euthyphro’s Dilemma. That you don’t own slaves is, again, another indicator that it isn’t from Him, as He’s a fan and, even if you reinterpret NT passages to make Him be against it, it still leaves you stuck because being unchanging, He doesn’t change, and being perfect, He’s perfect, meaning that a perfect and unchanging center of absolute, unchanging morality commanded things that were, by His own absolute and unchanging standard, absolutely immoral.”"
I normally don’t make a habit of addressing strawman arguments such as these, but for the sake of those reading along, I will make an exception. Slavery = not absolutely morally wrong for the Israelites living under a Theocracy. Slavery = absolutely morally wrong for us today as non-Israelites who don’t live under a theocracy. Apples and oranges.
I said: “What is that standard and how do you account for it?”
You replied: “”If you aren’t talking about moral right and wrong (which would fall under Moral Philosophy) but rather “is” and “is not”, then scientific investigation is the single best tool we have for the latter.”"
While this doesn’t even come close to answering my original question which was in regards to truth, I will take what I can get from you at this point. How do you know that ’scientific investigation’ is the single best tool we have? Where have you observed this?
I said: “If evolution were true, you couldn’t even make sense of that statement. After all, what is a ‘lie’ in an evolutionary universe?”
You said: “”A and not-A. If I say a square is a circle, knowing that it’s not, then by definition I’m a liar.”"
Is lying absolutely morally wrong in your worldview? If so, why? If not, who cares?
Since you brought it up, why can’t a square be a circle in your worldview? Is it your position that anything is possible or that only certain things are possible?
I said: “Although some misguided Christians do accept evolution, I would argue that they don’t understand either Christianity or evolution, as the two are not compatible in the least.”
You said: “”And they’d say the same thing about you.”"
Can both of our positions be correct at the same time and in the same way? Why or why not?
I said: “Which they clearly are not meant to be taken as.”
You said: “”Clearly. Your exegesis is superior to theirs. Also, your Holy Spirit is guiding you, while they’re only listening to the buzz of whatever in their hearts. You’re right and everybody else is wrong. You’re right, not because you’re actually correct, but because Theology is the only science where you’re never wrong.”"
Nope. The laws of logic dictate that when two people hold two opposing views about the same thing, at least one of them is wrong. As Christians, though, we can study the Bible and appeal to an absolute standard of logic and reason in order to arrive at truth and settle disputes. The question is, how do you account for and arrive at truth (which is certain by definition) in a worldview which denies God?
I said: “Again, it is worth noting that this is why Christians should not take their Bible exegesis from those who deny the authority of Scripture. Too many misrepresentations.”
You said: “”I know, right? I mean, even most of the early members of the Enlightenment (and shortly before) thought that they were good Christians while they were looking at the evidence of the real world and they thought that they were figuring out His handiwork. Outrage! I, personally, can’t believe that believers like Linnaeus actually believed that God would order life as though the soon to be realized Theory of Evolution were true! And don’t even get me started on that bastard of a so-called “believer” Charles Lyell! “Things must be much older than we thought” indeed! Pah!”"
What people believe has nothing to do with what is true. It is not my position that Christians know everything, but that God has revealed some things to us so that we can know them for certain. It would take sheer intellectual dishonesty to deny such a possibility.
I said: “Nice argument. See what I mean!”
You said: “”Hey, you’re the one who, I assume, argues for a literal worldwide Flood on or around 2348BC that resulted in a geologic column that only works if, say, hydrodynamic sorting didn’t exist back then (if it did, the big, heavy things would be at the bottom), half-life worked radically differently than it does now (while still leaving evidence as though it didn’t) and, oddly, that flowering plants were better at outrunning a flood than the (to the reality-based community) earlier plants (while simultaneously growing in soil underwater during it) and you don’t mind the “Flood canopy” resulting in a pre-Deluge Earth having Venus-like temperature and pressure. And that’s just for starters. You aren’t against just the Theory of Evolution, you’re standing against all science. And if you aren’t arguing for that Flood, then why don’t you take that part literally?”"
I will be happy to discuss any evidence and proof you wish Modusoperandi as soon as you tell me how it is possible for you to know anything in your worldview. I’m sure you’d agree that discussing proof with someone who can’t account for the concepts of proof or knowledge would be a colossal waste of time, no?
joe agnost said,
“”So all of those really devout muslims (who pray 5 times a day, make the trek to Mecca, fast through Ramadan, etc.) know in their hearts that they’re wrong?”"
Yep.
“”I understand why you might (incorrectly) think atheists “KNOW” god exists, but why would the muslims spend so much time and energy appeasing a god they “KNOW” doesn’t exist? It doesn’t make sense (even from a creationist!)”"
Beats me. People have many different motives for suppressing the truth. What’s yours?
Modusoperandi,
I said: “You see Kevin I can say that all of the above are ABSOLUTELY morally wrong in my worldview, while you can’t.”
You said: “”Ahem”"
Cough drop?
(So, you’re not content with simply dodging my questions to you and feel the need to dodge everyone else’s for them too, eh?)
I said: “(although I’m sure you’d feel differently if any of these acts were committed against you or a member of your own family).”
You said: “”Well, you’re partway to a humanist system of morality…it’s remarkable what a little empathy can do.”"
So whose feelings should take precedence in a humanist system of morality? The rapist who really wants to rape or the person who really doesn’t want to be raped? What if you live in a society where the majority feels that rape is OK and sympathizes with that point of view, is it therefore ‘right’?
I said: “This law states that something CANNOT be true and not true at the same time and in the same way. Without this law, it would be impossible to make sense of anything or to ever know anything. If it is your position that men invented this law, let me ask you this–do you believe that the universe could have existed and not existed at the same time and in the same way BEFORE men created the law of non-contradiction?”
You said: “”First of all, Laws reflect the universe. They’re descriptive.”"
If the laws of logic are descriptive, why should they apply to anything other than that which is being described? Where have you observed that A CANNOT be not A at the same time and in the same way? Does the law of non-contradiction NECESSARILY apply to our discussion?
“”Secondly, false dicotomy; God declared it, Man “invented” it, it simply is.”"
Really? Well then, God exists because he simply does. How’s that?
I said: “If this is directed at me, please show me where I have said this.”
You replied: “”I pray that you do not carry that attitude to your grave (or even into tomorrow, for that matter), as the consequences are eternal.”"
Not even close to what Kevin wrote. Thanks for the verification!
I said: “Not just Kevin, but all who deny the God of the Bible.”
You said: “”So, is that why General Revelation alone always results in the wrong answer? (that answer, historically speaking, being a bunch of spirits/gods)”"
Do you deny the possibility that an omniscient, omnipotent God could reveal some things to us so that we could be certain of them? If so, on what grounds?
“Undoubtedly he refuses to debate out of fear of the absolute smack down he and every evolutionists would get in such a publically viewed debate.”
LOL… The only thing bible-believin’ retards smack are their wives.
“Slavery = not absolutely morally wrong for the Israelites living under a Theocracy. Slavery = absolutely morally wrong for us today as non-Israelites who don’t live under a theocracy. Apples and oranges.”
LMAO. Let me guess, you don’t do the whole “applicable to Israelites then // not applicable for non-Israelites now” jive when it comes to the gays, right?
PAJOHN, Ray’s ministry made $100,000 a week last year, with the all publicity I guarentee that’s gone up, Ray’s salary is $120,000 plus benefits. It’s not like they are lacking the money. Ray is the one wanting the debate how about he contact HBO then and organize it?
Richard Dawkins had a debate just this week. He’s not afraid of debate, he just not going to waste time on Creationists. He actually said so during the debate. That’s simply the point, Dawkins has always had this rule, Ray knew that before asking. So asking someone you know is going to say no? he’s just doing it for the publicity. Dawkins reply was ‘ok, I’ll do it, I’ll break the rule for a charitable donation to my science foundation’ and Ray blinked first.
The ball is entirely in Ray’s court. He needs to make the next move.
Oh and of course Ray would be selling copies of the debate to the faithful through his website. Just like the Thunderf00t chat.
scmike wrote: “People have many different motives for suppressing the truth. What’s yours?”
~Your~ “truth”? ~My~ reason? Simple really… it’s called REALITY!
You don’t think our senses are particularly trustworthy. You don’t think historical data is worth anything when deciding how something will behave in the future.
You write things like “I want to know what basis you have for assuming that your senses and reasoning are reliable at all.” and “You must presuppose that the senses and reasoning with which you observe ‘things’ are themselves reliable.”
So if I understand you, you don’t think we’re justified in believing our senses UNLESS you’re reading a bible – then it’s OK. I mean, if you’re going to question our senses being “reliable” how can you know your senses aren’t failing you when you read the bible?
You show just how difficult it is to be a theist – a bible literalist certainly – and NOT be a hypocrite. Nice job!
I appreciate the candidness he took with his answers. It shows he is a fallible human being, and it wasn’t nearly as self-righteous as he routinely comes across.
Thanks for sharing this with us.
scmike “Tell you what, why don’t you provide your contrary claim as to why you expect nature to be uniform and let’s compare.”
I think history backs me up. Sure, the sun might not come up tomorrow, but I doubt it.
“Yep. You must presuppose that the senses and reasoning with which you observe ‘things’ are themselves reliable. What is your basis for this assumption?”
That they’ve done a pretty good job so far. Would you like me to answer your questions a third time, later on?
“Not that I grant you the validity of your senses and reasoning, but how do you know it ‘works’?”
Because, over the entire course of my life, the chair that appears to be under me has consistently, indeed invariably, performed the functions expected of a chair. Except when I’ve been either drunk or really tired, but that’s not the fault of the chair. It’s the fault of reduced perceptual accuracy.
“To what end does it ‘work’?”
When I put on clothes in the morning, throughout the day nobody, and I mean nobody, gives any indication that I’m really naked.
The “enter” key on my keyboard always makes
the line on which I’m typing drop one line.
“True, but I want to know what basis you have for assuming that your senses and reasoning are reliable at all.”
Oh, hell. Because. They. Work. (again, not perfectly, but close enough.
The body has a hard time with things outside of common experience, as with the very large or the very small, and with differences of less than 10%)
“I don’t doubt that our senses are helpful, as I know they are a wonderful gift from God.”
Really? Tell that to my tinitus.
“I want to know on what basis you proceed with the assumption that your senses and the reasoning with which you interpret them are reliable.”
Again, because they work (well enough, most of the time).
“So far, no dice.”
Only because you aren’t listening. And maybe because I’m not much of a speaker. I never learned real goodly.
“Took you that long, huh?”
Not really. From your second comment it was obvious, even to my imperfect senses.
“I’m sure you’d agree though, that if you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable, then you certainly can’t know what reality is or that your observation of it are valid. Priceless!”
I can’t know X-rays without artificial help. I can’t know amoeba without artificial help. I can’t know more than about 90mph without help (and that 90mph on its own requires a probably fatal fall).
Is what I see all? No. Is what I hear all? No. Is what I feel all? No.
Does assuming that God did it help? No. It just replaces reasonable doubt with unearned confidence.
“Nor am I an Israelite living under a Theocracy. What’s your point?”
My point was perfectly obvious. That you ignore it shows that you’re not even attempting to argue in good faith.
“(I do appreciate your admission, though, that slavery is NOT absolutely morally wrong in your worldview. Nice.)”
I do appreciate your avoidance of the subject of slavery as it pertains to absolute morality, though.
“I normally don’t make a habit of addressing strawman arguments such as these…”
It’s not a strawman. Whether or not it was a theocracy, whether or not any variable whatsoever, if absolute morality is absolute, what’s wrong is always wrong.
I’m dense, but you’re thick. If we were both liquids, you’d sink in me. Also, we’d make a terrible drink.
“Slavery = not absolutely morally wrong for the Israelites living under a Theocracy. Slavery = absolutely morally wrong for us today as non-Israelites who don’t live under a theocracy. Apples and oranges.”
No, no, Ten times no. It’s either absolute or it’s not. That’s the thing with absolute morality; it has no grey. “Well, it was okay for them but not for us” isn’t absolute morality, it’s cultural relativism.
“While this doesn’t even come close to answering my original question which was in regards to truth, I will take what I can get from you at this point. How do you know that ’scientific investigation’ is the single best tool we have? Where have you observed this?”
Because. It. Works. You’re not even trying to grasp the point.
“Is lying absolutely morally wrong in your worldview? If so, why? If not, who cares?”
No. Sometimes the outcome of any decision is either “harm” or “less harm”. Lying to Nazis about hiding Jews in your home is justified. Lying “just because”, though, in the long run, benefits no one. Societal and familial unity, for lack of a better term, requires, on occasion, um, let’s say “diplomatic” use of language.
“Since you brought it up, why can’t a square be a circle in your worldview?”
Because a square, by definition is the word that represents an actual or ideal square.
“Is it your position that anything is possible or that only certain things are possible?”
It is theoretically possible that the atoms of me will move in between the atoms of this wall if I walk in to it but, statistically, it’s beyond doubtful.
“Can both of our positions be correct at the same time and in the same way? Why or why not?”
Can an apple simultaneously be an orange? I doubt it. One of you us wrong. I’m siding with the group that doesn’t declare the thing to be proved axiomatic.
“As Christians, though, we can study the Bible and appeal to an absolute standard of logic and reason in order to arrive at truth and settle disputes.”
So how’s that working out? Still schisming?
“The question is, how do you account for and arrive at truth (which is certain by definition) in a worldview which denies God?”
Repeated observation and the constant reappraisal for potential falsification. It works pretty well at getting at the truth, if not right on it.
“What people believe has nothing to do with what is true.”
…says the Presuppositionalist.
“It is not my position that Christians know everything, but that God has revealed some things to us so that we can know them for certain.”
We both believe in a rational universe. Congratulations.
“It would take sheer intellectual dishonesty to deny such a possibility.”
It would take sheer intellectual dishonesty to deny the actual history of the universe because it conflicts with a book that people wrote (eventually, after passing it orally for quite a while).
“I will be happy to discuss any evidence and proof you wish Modusoperandi as soon as you tell me how it is possible for you to know anything in your worldview.”
I. Don’t. Care. Presuppositionalists are like slightly better read YECs. Adding the sheen of philosophy to the tattered pages of theology doesn’t make Genesis any less wrong.
“I’m sure you’d agree that discussing proof with someone who can’t account for the concepts of proof or knowledge would be a colossal waste of time, no?”
Proofs are for math. Science deals in probabilities. I’d forgotten how irritating it is talking with Presuppositionalists. Thanks for reminding me. Enjoy wallowing in your zealous confidence. I’ll stick with doubt. It’s a better path to knowledge.
“(So, you’re not content with simply dodging my questions to you and feel the need to dodge everyone else’s for them too, eh?)
”
Well, you’re the one who subsribes to absolute morality from divine sources, then switches to relative morality when it comes to slavery.
“So whose feelings should take precedence in a humanist system of morality? The rapist who really wants to rape or the person who really doesn’t want to be raped? What if you live in a society where the majority feels that rape is OK and sympathizes with that point of view, is it therefore ‘right’?”
Your Liberty to punch me in the nose ends where your fist ends and my nose begins. That, empathy and the Golden Rule form a pretty good basis for figuring out how to minimize misery.
“Where have you observed that A CANNOT be not A at the same time and in the same way?”
Where have you observed that it can?
“Really? Well then, God exists because he simply does. How’s that?”
Oh, tosh! With God, pending evidence to the contrary, the null hypothesis applies.
“Not even close to what Kevin wrote. Thanks for the verification!”
Again, you aren’t even trying to argue in good faith. You wrote a variant of the standard “lack of faith leads to…” threat and Kevin called you on it.
“Do you deny the possibility that an omniscient, omnipotent God could reveal some things to us so that we could be certain of them?”
No. When one does, be sure to call me. So far, all the various Special Revelations look like products of their time, with some parts that age well, and others poorly and some parts that were right and others wrong.
Woody Tanaka,
I said: “Slavery = not absolutely morally wrong for the Israelites living under a Theocracy. Slavery = absolutely morally wrong for us today as non-Israelites who don’t live under a theocracy. Apples and oranges.”
You said: “”LMAO. Let me guess, you don’t do the whole “applicable to Israelites then // not applicable for non-Israelites now” jive when it comes to the gays, right?”"
Nope. Sexual immorality is absolutely morally wrong for everyone (which, by the way, is something you could never say).
Watch, I’ll show you what I mean. Is molesting children absolutely wrong according to your worldview, or could it be right?
scmike wrote: “Sexual immorality is absolutely morally wrong for everyone”
Unlike slavery though right?
I must say – I enjoyed modusoperandi’s comment above. He pretty much skewers your ideas. I love how you don’t know what “absolute morality” means! Too funny!
joe agnost,
I said: “People have many different motives for suppressing the truth. What’s yours?”
You said: “”~Your~ “truth”? ~My~ reason? Simple really… it’s called REALITY!”"
And how do you know that yours or anyone else’s perceptions of ‘reality’ are valid or normal? If two people have two conflicting perceptions of reality, how do you know whose is correct, or are all perceptions of reality equally valid?
“”You don’t think our senses are particularly trustworthy.”"
Sure I do, as they are a wonderful gift from God. My argument is that APART from God, one has no basis for assuming the validity of their senses and reasoning. I’ll show you what I mean. On what basis do you proceed with the assumption that your senses and reasoning are reliable, Joe?
“”You don’t think historical data is worth anything when deciding how something will behave in the future.”"
Sure I do, as I have justification for assuming that the future will be like the past based on the promises of God. My argument is that APART from God, you have no logical justification for such an assumption (as you have previously demonstrated for us).
“”You write things like “I want to know what basis you have for assuming that your senses and reasoning are reliable at all.””"
And you continue to dodge the question because it is devastating to your worldview. Keep it up!
“”So if I understand you, you don’t think we’re justified in believing our senses UNLESS you’re reading a bible – then it’s OK.”"
Nope, you definitely don’t understand me. It is my position that apart from Divine revelation from a Being who knows everything, it is impossible for anyone to know anything (including that their senses and reasoning are valid).
“”You show just how difficult it is to be a theist – a bible literalist certainly – and NOT be a hypocrite. Nice job!”"
I welcome any intellectually honest reader to examine our posts and see which of us has been consistent with their professed beliefs and who has not.
scmike wrote: “My argument is that APART from God, one has no basis for assuming the validity of their senses and reasoning.”
So it’s your contention that because you believe in god YOUR senses are trustworthy, but because I do not believe in god MINE are not?
That is a seriously flawed proposal… our senses are the same regardless WHAT we believe in.
scmike wrote: “On what basis do you proceed with the assumption that your senses and reasoning are reliable, Joe?”
Oh. My. Dog. Are you seriously this thick? Did you even read modusoperandi’s replies? My replies? This has been pointed out to you many times…
Let me quote Modus for this answer because it’s the exact same reason as mine: “That they’ve done a pretty good job so far.” or “Because. It. Works. You’re not even trying to grasp the point.”
You really do ask this question a lot!
Damn… I just read your next line: “And you continue to dodge the question because it is devastating to your worldview.”
The question has been answered many many times – but like Ray Comfort your ears (eyes?) are plugged.
“Nope. Sexual immorality is absolutely morally wrong for everyone ”
LMAO. I knew it, you hypocrite. The best part is that your thinking is so diseased from religion that you probably don’t see that you are using naked moral relativism in defending moral absolutism.
“(which, by the way, is something you could never say).”
I don’t believe the statement, because there is no such thing as “absolute morality,” nor, if there is even such a thing as “sexual immorality,” certainly consensual sex between adults of any kind or number, would certainly not be immoral. Morality is a social construct.
“Watch, I’ll show you what I mean. Is molesting children absolutely wrong according to your worldview, or could it be right?”"
In my worldview, molesting children is morally wrong. (The word “absolute” in this context is unnecessary and meaningless.)
Hey, I have a question for you, is ever morally right for infants and toddlers to be intentionally burned to death or drowned? Or are those things absolute, universal, moral wrongs?
Modusoperandi,
I said: “Tell you what, why don’t you provide your contrary claim as to why you expect nature to be uniform and let’s compare.”
You said: “”I think history backs me up. Sure, the sun might not come up tomorrow, but I doubt it.”"
The problem is, I’m not asking you about the past, I’m asking you about the FUTURE. What basis do you have to assume that the future will even remotely be like the past other than the viciously circular argument “the future will be like the past because the future has been like the past in the past”? If you have none, just say so, as that is my point.
I asked: “Yep. You must presuppose that the senses and reasoning with which you observe ‘things’ are themselves reliable.
What is your basis for this assumption?”"
You said: “”That they’ve done a pretty good job so far.”"
Did you reason this? If so, you’re arguing that you have reasoned that your reasoning is valid. Nope, nothing illogical about that!
I asked: “Not that I grant you the validity of your senses and reasoning, but how do you know it ‘works’?”
You replied: “”Because, over the entire course of my life, the chair that appears to be under me has consistently, indeed invariably, performed the functions expected of a chair.”"
Let me guess, you made this observation using senses and reasoning that you sensed and reasoned were valid, right? Priceless!
I said: “I want to know on what basis you proceed with the assumption that your senses and the reasoning with which you interpret them are reliable.”
You said: “”Again, because they work (well enough, most of the time).”"
See above.
I said: “I’m sure you’d agree though, that if you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable, then you certainly can’t know what reality is or that your observation of it are valid. Priceless!”
You said: “”Is what I see all? No. Is what I hear all? No. Is what I feel all? No.
Does assuming that God did it help? No. It just replaces reasonable doubt with unearned confidence.”"
Hey, I’ll take the confidence that comes from the certainty of God over the hopelessly circular position of atheism any day, Mr. ‘I sense and reason that my senses and reasoning are valid’. What a hoot!
I said: “Slavery = not absolutely morally wrong for the Israelites living under a Theocracy. Slavery = absolutely morally wrong for us today as non-Israelites who don’t live under a theocracy. Apples and oranges.”
You said: “”No, no, Ten times no. It’s either absolute or it’s not.”"
Is that absolutely true? How do you know?
“”That’s the thing with absolute morality; it has no grey.”"
Is that absolutely true? How do you know (especially if you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable)?
Hey, I don’t know what all the fuss is about Modusoperandi. Biblical slavery for the Jews who lived under a Theocracy not being absolutely morally wrong has nothing to do with modern day slavery as we know it being absolutely morally wrong. Again, apples and oranges.
Besides, if you’re honest, you’d be forced to admit that slavery is not absolutely morally wrong in your worldview, and in fact, could be right (Yes, I noticed you avoided this point last time).
I said: “While this doesn’t even come close to answering my original question which was in regards to truth, I will take what I can get from you at this point. How do you know that ’scientific investigation’ is the single best tool we have? Where have you observed this?”
You said: “”Because. It. Works. You’re not even trying to grasp the point.”"
Please tell us again how you know that the senses and reasoning you used to determine this are valid. It never gets old!
I asked: “Is lying absolutely morally wrong in your worldview? If so, why? If not, who cares?”
You asked: “”No. Sometimes the outcome of any decision is either “harm” or “less harm”. Lying to Nazis about hiding Jews in your home is justified.”"
The fact that something may be justifiable has nothing to do with it being absolutely right or wrong. Try again.
“”Lying “just because”, though, in the long run, benefits no one.”"
Oh? Guess you’ve never heard of politics.
Besides, who gets to determine what is ‘beneficial’ and what is not? If this is arbitrary, then anyone is free to determine what is ‘beneficial’ to them, including liars.
I asked: “Since you brought it up, why can’t a square be a circle in your worldview?”
You said: “”Because a square, by definition is the word that represents an actual or ideal square.”"
Can that change, or is it absolutely true?
I asked: “Is it your position that anything is possible or that only certain things are possible?”
You said: “”It is theoretically possible that the atoms of me will move in between the atoms of this wall if I walk in to it but, statistically, it’s beyond doubtful.”"
Problem is, if anything is possible, then you have zero basis for assuming any sort of uniformity in the universe. This means that any thing you claim to know to be true today could change tomorrow and become false (not to mention you have already admitted that you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable). You therefore lose any foundation for truth or knowledge which makes any argument you level against me baseless and without merit. Nice worldview ya got there.
I asked: “Can both of our positions be correct at the same time and in the same way? Why or why not?”
You said: “”Can an apple simultaneously be an orange? I doubt it.”"
But you are forced to admit that it is possible in your worldview, which means you have no means of arriving at truth or knowledge. I am pleased with that.
“”One of you us wrong.”"
But you could be wrong about that, right?
I said: “The question is, how do you account for and arrive at truth (which is certain by definition) in a worldview which denies God?”
You said: “”Repeated observation and the constant reappraisal for potential falsification.”"
And you do this using senses and reasoning that you sense and reason are valid, right? You’ve got to be kidding me.
“”It works pretty well at getting at the truth, if not right on it.”"
How do you know that, especially if you don’t know that your senses and reasoning are valid?
I said: “What people believe has nothing to do with what is true.”
You said: “”…says the Presuppositionalist.”"
Hey, if you disagree, the floor is yours.
“”We both believe in a rational universe. Congratulations.”"
Yet only one of us can logically account for an absolute standard by which to measure rationality (hint: it ain’t you). How odd.
I said: “I’m sure you’d agree that discussing proof with someone who can’t account for the concepts of proof or knowledge would be a colossal waste of time, no?”
You said: “”Proofs are for math. Science deals in probabilities.”"
If that’s the case, then your statement that ‘proofs are for math. Science deals in probabilities’ can never be proven true and is therefore meaningless. You’re too much!
“”I’d forgotten how irritating it is talking with Presuppositionalists.”"
No doubt it is uncomfortable having your worldview exposed for what it is. Remember though, the truth only hurts when it should.
You said: “”Your Liberty to punch me in the nose ends where your fist ends and my nose begins. That, empathy and the Golden Rule form a pretty good basis for figuring out how to minimize misery.”"
Is ‘minimizing misery’ absolutely morally right? How do you know?
I asked: “Where have you observed that A CANNOT be not A at the same time and in the same way?”
You said: “”Where have you observed that it can?”"
So, the validity of the law of non-contradiction is based upon my observations? Didn’t realize I held that much sway in your life.
How can logic be contingent upon our observations when we use logic to interpret our observations? Surely you’re not going to argue that logic validates logic, are you (although it wouldn’t suprise me at this point).
I said: “Not even close to what Kevin wrote. Thanks for the verification!”
You said: “”Again, you aren’t even trying to argue in good faith. You wrote a variant of the standard “lack of faith leads to…” threat and Kevin called you on it.”"
What Kevin listed was a quote, hence the quotation marks. Please show me where I stated what he quoted me as saying. Otherwise, apology accepted.
I said: “Do you deny the possibility that an omniscient, omnipotent God could reveal some things to us so that we could be certain of them?”
You said: “”No.”"
Great, then you admit that I have a possible avenue to certainty, whereas you have none. I am pleased with that concession, as that has been my point all along.
You see, the fact that those who deny God cannot live consistently with their professed beliefs confirms the reality that they are merely suppressing the truth of God’s existence despite knowing otherwise.
Now that you have seen atheism exposed for what it really is, I pray that you will cease this charade Modusoperandi, and submit to the one true God through his son Jesus Christ before it’s too late. Take care.
joe agnost,
I said: “Sexual immorality is absolutely morally wrong for everyone”
You said: “”Unlike slavery though right?”"
No. Slavery as we know it is absolutely morally wrong. Thought we already covered that.
“”I must say – I enjoyed modusoperandi’s comment above.”"
I’m not surprised, he seems to be about your level.
“”I love how you don’t know what “absolute morality” means! Too funny!”"
Since you keep bringing it up, is slavery, rape, murder, or child molestation absolutely wrong according to your worldview? (I know why you people don’t want to answer this. Keep it up!)
P.S. You still haven’t told me how (or if) you can know anything for certain in your worldview. Well?
joe agnost,
I said: “My argument is that APART from God, one has no basis for assuming the validity of their senses and reasoning.”
You said: “”So it’s your contention that because you believe in god YOUR senses are trustworthy, but because I do not believe in god MINE are not?”"
No, it’s my contention that apart from the God of the Bible, one cannot justify the validity of their senses and reasoning.
For proof of this, see Modusoperandi’s post where he claims to validate his senses and reasoning WITH his senses and reasoning. Hilarious!!
“”That is a seriously flawed proposal… our senses are the same regardless WHAT we believe in.”"
I would ask how you know your senses and reasoning are valid, but I think I’ve had enough humor for one day.
I asked: “On what basis do you proceed with the assumption that your senses and reasoning are reliable, Joe?”
You said: “”Oh. My. Dog. Are you seriously this thick? Did you even read modusoperandi’s replies?”"
Yep, and my sides are still hurting!
“”Let me quote Modus for this answer because it’s the exact same reason as mine: “That they’ve done a pretty good job so far.” or “Because. It. Works.”"
Stop it! I can’t take anymore!!
scmike “Hey, I don’t know what all the fuss is about Modusoperandi. Biblical slavery for the Jews who lived under a Theocracy not being absolutely morally wrong has nothing to do with modern day slavery as we know it being absolutely morally wrong. Again, apples and oranges.”
No. Again you’re wrong. Absolute morality that isn’t absolute is not absolute morality. It’s relative morality. If it was right for them but wrong for us then it, by definition, cannot be absolute morality. Note too, that, being absolute, this also applies to God (and if you can’t see where that leads, you’re not looking).
“Besides, if you’re honest, you’d be forced to admit that slavery is not absolutely morally wrong in your worldview, and in fact, could be right (Yes, I noticed you avoided this point last time).”
I view it as wrong now, but a solution to a real problem at the time. Call me a relativist. Now, again, deny that you aren’t, even though you’ve already said as much, while denying you were.
“The fact that something may be justifiable has nothing to do with it being absolutely right or wrong. Try again.”
Oh, heck. You’re not even listening. Lying is wrong, except in comparison when the alternative is more wrong. Life is greyer than black and white. Degrees of absolute, rather than absolute absolute, if you’re willing to let me mangle definitions as badly as you’ve been doing.
“Can that change, or is it absolutely true?”
Again, you’re not even listening. By definition a square is square. If it isn’t, it’s not a square.
“Problem is, if anything is possible, then you have zero basis for assuming any sort of uniformity in the universe…”
*Ding ding* I’ll take “the supernaturalist shoots himself in the foot” for two hundred, Alex (See my first comment from here, earlier). You see, knocking out my foundation (which is probabilistic) also knocks out yours (which is absolute), which hurts your argument more than it does mine, since mine is only “reasonably certain” and capable of change while yours is zealous and supposedly already perfect. Kudos for putting a dent in my flexible foundation while, again, shattering yours.
“Science deals in probabilities’ can never be proven true and is therefore meaningless.”
Does not follow. I should’ve started playing “logical fallacy bingo” earlier. I’d probably have a full card by now.
“So, the validity of the law of non-contradiction is based upon my observations?”
No. It’s based on what is. “There are no black swans” is correct until one is found (or secondary evidence of one is, much like black holes being theorized and reasonably proven before they were found because there were effects as though they were there), which only works for actual objects. If can imagine a square that’s not square, it’s not a square.
“What Kevin listed was a quote, hence the quotation marks.”
Oh boy! More games of semantics!
“Great, then you admit that I have a possible avenue to certainty, whereas you have none. I am pleased with that concession, as that has been my point all along.”
I’m not a zealot. There’s always room for doubt. Doubt leads to questions which leads to learning. Absolute certainty leads to an inability to grow (which, to be on-topic for a moment, is revealed quite clearly in Ray Comfort).
“Now that you have seen atheism exposed for what it really is, I pray that you will cease this charade Modusoperandi, and submit to the one true God through his son Jesus Christ before it’s too late. Take care.”
Uh huh. I’ve just seen you argue in bad faith while playing semantics and confusing definitions, with a dash of logical fallacies thrown in for flavour. In short, I’ve been talking to an apologist.
It’s conversations like this that pretty much destroyed my ability to argue in good faith. Thanks for reminding me of that. Now go back to staring at your navel in perfect confidence in the Transcendental Argument for God (ignoring, of course, critiques of TAG, of which even a casual googling will come up with many fine examples).
scmike wrote: “Slavery as we know it is absolutely morally wrong.”
Except for “Israelites living under a Theocracy” though right? Of course since you don’t know what “absolute morality” means you can make that statement.
Joe agnost, I should warn you (if you haven’t already realized) that he’s now playing semantics with the term “slavery”:
…because owning people was different back then than owning people is now, which still digs him a hole, just a different one, as before it was:
…which, since he appeared to be using the same version of “slavery”, was (as he continues to do) misdefining “absolute”.
Alternately, he is now equivocating between definitions of the same word, “slavery” (those being ancient middle east slavery and, most probably, antebellum chattel slavery), which would be another fallacy for my game of Logical Fallacy Bingo.
Woody Tanaka,
I said: “Nope. Sexual immorality is absolutely morally wrong for everyone”
You said: “”LMAO. I knew it, you hypocrite. The best part is that your thinking is so diseased from religion that you probably don’t see that you are using naked moral relativism in defending moral absolutism.”"
What part of slavery as we know it is absolutely morally wrong did you not understand?
I said: “(which, by the way, is something you could never say).”
You said: “”I don’t believe the statement, because there is no such thing as “absolute morality,”"
Is it absolutely true that you don’t believe the statement and that there is no such thing as absolute morality? Surely you can see the absurdity of absolutely denying the existence of absolutes, no?
“”nor, if there is even such a thing as “sexual immorality,” certainly consensual sex between adults of any kind or number, would certainly not be immoral.”"
Is that absolutely true, or could you be wrong?
Is non-consensual sex between adults absolutely morally wrong, or could it be right in your worldview?
“”Morality is a social construct.”"
If morality is arbitrarily stipulated, then anyone is free to stipulate their own morality, including murderers, rapists, thieves, and child molesters. In fact, if one society decided that these things were perfectly acceptable, no one would have the right to tell them differently or to interfere with them.
In fact, if your worldview were true, no one had any right to condemn the actions of Hitler and the Nazi’s, much less put a stop to them. Nice worldview ya got there Woody, you should be real proud.
I said: “Watch, I’ll show you what I mean. Is molesting children absolutely wrong according to your worldview, or could it be right?”
You said: “”In my worldview, molesting children is morally wrong. (The word “absolute” in this context is unnecessary and meaningless.)”"
So then it is not morally wrong in all places and at all times, which means it is right in some places and at some times?! Who gets to decide, the molester or the child? Unbelievable.
“”Hey, I have a question for you, is ever morally right for infants and toddlers to be intentionally burned to death or drowned?Or are those things absolute, universal, moral wrongs?”"
The murder of infants (or anyone for that matter) is absolutely, universally, morally wrong, which is something you could never say (as you have already demonstrated). I am pleased with that.
“What part of slavery as we know it is absolutely morally wrong did you not understand?”
You made an exception to this supposed absolute moral wrong for certain people under a certain form of government. Thus, your supposed “absolute” moral wrong is not absolute.
“Is it absolutely true that you don’t believe the statement and that there is no such thing as absolute morality?”
There is no such thing as absolute truth, (outside of things that are defined as such, such as mathematics and logic.)
“Surely you can see the absurdity of absolutely denying the existence of absolutes, no?”
There is nothing absurd about it. Truth is relative and contingent.
“Is that absolutely true, or could you be wrong?”
I could be wrong. It is contingent.
“Is non-consensual sex between adults absolutely morally wrong, or could it be right in your worldview?”
In my worldview and in the morality of this society, it is wrong. (Not “absolutely” wrong, because the “absolute” part is unnecessary.) Sadly, it is not seen as wrong in other societies.
“If morality is arbitrarily stipulated, then anyone is free to stipulate their own morality, including murderers, rapists, thieves, and child molesters. In fact, if one society decided that these things were perfectly acceptable, no one would have the right to tell them differently or to interfere with them.”
You are making the false assumption that there are only two options: a wholly objective, absolute morality, and a wholly subjective, relative morality. There are other options.
And further, you assume that if morality were wholly subjective, that part of that moral order would require, as a moral tenet, a “non-interference” belief, precluding one from imposing his or her beliefs on those that subjectively believe something else. Neither of these things is supportable.
And, yes, a society of thieves would have different moral principles about theft than mine does. However, nothing requires me or the society of which I am a part to respect that morality. (And, indeed, every society does exactly that.)
As morality is a social construct, it is constrained and shaped by the society in which it arises. As a result, although morality is not objective, it isn’t wholly subjective, either. It is biased.
“In fact, if your worldview were true, no one had any right to condemn the actions of Hitler and the Nazi’s, much less put a stop to them.”
Wrong. One of the moral principles of my worldview (and with most civilized people) is to condemn those who take the actions of a Hitler and the Nazis and to act to put a stop to them.
“So then it is not morally wrong in all places and at all times, which means it is right in some places and at some times?! Who gets to decide, the molester or the child?”
In my worldview, it is wrong. The child molester has a different view. Because most people agree with me, we impose our view of morality on him and punish him if he acts against our moral view. Again, recognizing that he has a different view of morality does not obligate me or the rest of society to respect his view one iota.
“‘Hey, I have a question for you, is ever morally right for infants and toddlers to be intentionally burned to death or drowned? Or are those things absolute, universal, moral wrongs?’”
“The murder of infants (or anyone for that matter) is absolutely, universally, morally wrong,”
So then you must agree that when God burned to death all of those innocent babies and toddlers at Sodom and Gomorrah, shrieking in pain and agony, and when he drowned all of those infants and children, clawing and climbing, trying to keep their little heads above the water during the Noah flood, that an absolute, universal moral wrong was committed. Of course, you must, otherwise, it is not an “absolute, universal moral wrong” to intentionally burn babies to death and drown toddlers. If you are making an exception, even for your god, then it is not “absolute” and “universal” and you made abundantly clear that your view, these things are absolute and universal.
So with that in mind, how can you live with yourself worshiping something that serially committed absolute, universal, moral wrongs of such horrific magnitude??
Oh, and I should also note that, if he is equivocating between Ancient Middle East slavery and antebellum chattel slavery and he’s using “absolute morality” properly, it’s because he’s for the former-style of slavery now (being absolute, if it was good back then then it’s good now). It’s not uncommon for presuppositionalists to also be biblical theonomists, but admitting that you’re for biblical law now looks really, really bad as advocating, essentially, that living in 2009 as though it’s 600BC or so makes one look like a savage (that it makes a mockery of Jesus’ sometimes radical reinterpretations is another matter entirely). See subjects like Christian Reconstructionism for further insight (and notice that presuppositionalism is listed among the “characteristic beliefs” for them). When you’re done that, picture a tiny government that spends a disproportionate amount of its energy persecuting (and stoning) gays, atheists, Buddhists, Muslims, Mormons, Catholics…well, pretty much everyone is guilty of the theonomists view of “unrighteousness” in one form or another. It’s essentially the destruction of everything that “makes us more civilized” than, say, Iran, Saudi Arabia or Taliban-era Afghanistan. Note as well that biblical law is completely different than Sharia law, as the latter comes from a false prophet while the former comes from the real, genuine God, even though the stones are similar and are being thrown by roughly similar groups (swapping only “Muslim” for “The Right Kind of Protestant”) at everyone not in that group.
It’s quite clear to me just how impossible it is reasoning with people like that… redefining words makes it rather difficult to continue a conversation!
Ah well – thanks for the tips modusoperandi….
Why are you trying to explain and argue for your position at all? Why defend it as reasonable? Isn’t divine inspiration enough?
Is your ability to reason necessary for your basic beliefs?
If it is not, can your basic beliefs still be reasoned to, or is it impossible to reason there?
If reason is necessary to reach your basic beliefs, can they be reasoned to without divine inspiration, or must the reasoning be inspired?
I think I can clear this one up for you.
War happens.
[...] A Big Fat Tool I was reading an interview with Ray Comfort over at Friendly Atheist. (Found HERE.) This question and answer stood out to me specifically: Hemant: You write on your website that [...]
Modusoperandi,
You said: “”No. Again you’re wrong.””
Are you absolutely sure I’m wrong, or could I, in fact, be right?
“”Absolute morality that isn’t absolute is not absolute morality. It’s relative morality. If it was right for them but wrong for us then it, by definition, cannot be absolute morality. “”
‘Cannot be’, huh? Ever? Are you absolutely certain of this, or could you be wrong?
You see, in order to know that something ‘cannot’ be, you would have to possess universal knowledge or have access to it. How is this possible in your worldview?
I said: “Besides, if you’re honest, you’d be forced to admit that slavery is not absolutely orally wrong in your worldview, and in fact, could be right (Yes, I noticed you avoided this point last time).”
You said: “”I view it as wrong now, but a solution to a real problem at the time.””
Exactly my point! You have no basis for condemning slavery of any kind in your worldview, as your objection boils down to a purely subjective personal preference which doesn’t necessarily apply to anyone else. In fact, you are forced to admit that, based on the arbitrariness of your worldview, slavery could be ‘considered right’ (as could rape, murder, child molestation, cannabilism, etc.). Unbelievable.
“”Call me a relativist.””
Actually I’d rather just ask you if it is absolutely true that you are a relativist, or is it only ‘relatively’ true?
I said: “The fact that something may be justifiable has nothing to do with it being absolutely right or wrong. Try again.”
You said: “”Oh, heck. You’re not even listening. Lying is wrong, except in comparison when the alternative is more wrong.””
Problem is, declaring one action to be ‘more wrong’ than another assumes an absolute standard by which to measure right and wrong. You see, if I say that the answer to ‘what is 2+2?’ is 26, and you say it’s 8, we’re both wrong, but your answer is ‘more right’ than mine because it is closer to the correct answer of 4 (in base 10 mathematics).
What is the absolute standard by which you determine any action to be ‘more right’ than another? How do you account for that standard? Why does it necessarily apply?
You said: “”Life is greyer than black and white. Degrees of absolute, rather than absolute absolute,””
Is this absolutely true, or could it be false? How do you know?
I asked: “Can that change, or is it absolutely true?”
You said: “”Again, you’re not even listening. By definition a square is square. If it isn’t, it’s not a square.””
And again I ask, is that absolutely true, or could it change? (I know why you don’t want to answer this, by the way)
I said: “Problem is, if anything is possible, then you have zero basis for assuming any sort of uniformity in the universe…”
You said: “”You see, knocking out my foundation (which is probabilistic) also knocks out yours (which is absolute), which hurts your argument more than it does mine, since mine is only “reasonably certain” and capable of change while yours is zealous and supposedly already perfect.””
Is this absolutely true, or only ‘probably’ true (in which case it could be false)? Let me know.
(Thanks though for the admission that I have ‘knocked out’ the foundation for your arguments)
“”Kudos for putting a dent in my flexible foundation while, again, shattering yours.””
Are you absolutely certain I have done this, or only ‘reasonably certain’ (in which case you could be wrong)? Let me know.
I said: “Science deals in probabilities’ can never be proven true and is therefore meaningless.”
You said: “”Does not follow.””
Sure it does. You stated that proof only applies to math, therefore the statement that ‘science deals in probabilities’ cannot be proven ( by your own admission), and is reduced to baseless assertion. Such is the inconsistency of a worldview which denies God.
You said: “”I should’ve started playing “logical fallacy bingo” earlier. I’d probably have a full card by now.””
Well, I haven’t been keeping count, but if I had to guess based solely on yours and Joe’s last few posts, I’d say you’re right.
I said: “So, the validity of the law of non-contradiction is based upon my observations?”
You said: “”No. It’s based on what is.””
Problem is, how can you know what ‘is’ if you can’t know that your senses and reasoning are reliable? In fact, how can you know anything in your worldview?
You said: ““There are no black swans” is correct until one is found””
No, it is only BELIEVED to be ‘correct’, as one cannot know something that could be false. If you disagree, perhaps you can give me an example of something you know that could be false.
Anyway, subjective belief has nothing to do with objective laws, unless you’re arguing that the laws of logic (including the law of non-contradiction) are subjective and don’t necessarily apply to anything. If that’s the case, this is about to get really fun!
You said: “”If can imagine a square that’s not a square, then it isn’t a square.”"
Yet again, is this absolutely true? If so, how do you know?
I said: “What Kevin listed was a quote, hence the quotation marks.”
You said: “”Oh boy! More games of semantics!””
Apology accepted!
I said: “Great, then you admit that I have a possible avenue to certainty, whereas you have none. I am pleased with that concession, as that has been my point all along.”
You said: “”I’m not a zealot.””
Uh, are you certain?
“”There’s always room for doubt.”"
Are you certain? (Thanks for doing that by the way)
“”Doubt leads to questions which leads to learning. Absolute certainty leads to an inability to grow (which, to be on-topic for a moment, is revealed quite clearly in Ray Comfort).”"
Are you absolutely certain of this? Sorry for the repitition, but you sure make a lot of knowledge claims for someone who has admitted that they can’t know anything. That SHOULD tell you something, by the way.
I said: “Now that you have seen atheism exposed for what it really is, I pray that you will cease this charade Modusoperandi, and submit to the one true God through his son Jesus Christ before it’s too late. Take care.”
You said: “”It’s conversations like this that pretty much destroyed my ability to argue in good faith. Thanks for reminding me of that.””
Don’t be so hard on yourself Modusoperandi. Your arguments weren’t THAT bad. Oh wait, yes they were! (Sorry, couldn’t resist)
schmike “Are you absolutely sure I’m wrong, or could I, in fact, be right?”
Adorable. Let’s run around in circles some more, shall we?
…
No. Let’s not.
“You see, in order to know that something ‘cannot’ be, you would have to possess universal knowledge or have access to it.”
Are you