I do believe that something created us (Humans). Aside from what I believe I have some questions about "God" and religion that most people cannot answer to me:

*Why are there many religions with different Gods? Which God is "God?

*Why does the church make so much damn money? Millions of dollars are donated, what happens to all that money?

*The bible was written by many people at different times, and even today revisions are being made. Isn't there a chance that something wasn't written in or that something was misunderstood or that it's all a story and nothing more?

*God loves all right? So why send us to hell if we're bad? I thought he loved us all and forgave our sins?

*Really, if there was one God, then everybody should believe in that one specific God, not there own. That shows that nobody not even the church knows the truth, it's all money.

Simple questions.

I believed in God for years, but when I began to take interest in religion I realized that there are NO hard facts or evidence that any of it is true.

If God is true then forgive me, but God himself hasn't showed us why we should go his way. Words are nothing these days, empty promises of salvation, still there is something out there that moves us.

forget the church why don't you just site down and read the bible cover to cover and ask God for the spirit of truth and revelation, Go to Barns & noble and get books read,read,read till your head popps theres only one God and he showed himself through out the times of man search through the hebrew roots

This is a good thread. To answer your questions is going to take some time. When I get more than 10 minutes, I'll respond thoroughly. Good questions.

Why are there many religions with different Gods? Which God is "God?

The unification of the world religions are not as divergent as they sometimes appear. According to more atheistic views, religion evolved or was the invention of humanoids. If this was the case, however, we'd expect to see vast differences from religion to religion. This really isn't the case. Most agree on some major points. Animal sacrifice is one of them... Actually, sacrifice at all. How could unassisted reason ever arrive at the conclusion that God/god/godess are properly worshiped through sacrifice? How could we reasonably assume that 'innocence' is required for atonement, if it were not initially instituted by God? If we say that one group of anthropoids could have stumbled upon this hapazardly, how could we then see such universialty in it? Sacrifice was done not only by the Hebrews, but also Greeks, Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Hindus and Chinese. They all speak of sacrifice long in vogue. This unity of religion on the issue of sacrifice bespeaks revelation and not some evolution.

Likewise, the division of time into 'weeks' of 7 is prevalent among ancients cultures, suggesting the commemoration of creation. The Babylonians observed the 7th and all the following denominations of seven as sacred days and sacred lunar months. It is widely admitted that even before Genesis was penned, it contained elements of traditions that have been around thousands of years prior, passed down verbally.

The belief in the immortality of the soul, or the 'soul' in general is also very telling. And of the soul, that it needs 'regeneration', whether it be through reincarnation or the need to be ritually cleansed of impurity, or of salvation granted by the Creator. The natural world can't account for these things. No power through the light of reason via nature can explain these things.

So it seems that all religion had a starting point. The fact that many point to one thing is something to be considered. Now, which one(s)?

Why does the church make so much damn money? Millions of dollars are donated, what happens to all that money?

The 'church' has always been a 'body of believers.' It has never been a 'place' or an 'institution'. I asssume, you are refering to the Catholic church who imposed such restrictions. I can tell you that in my fellowship (church) the money is constantly revolving. It goes to buying food for the hungry or clothes for the cold. It goes to missionary work. It goes to the basic ammenities, like the electric and water bill. Some of the money goes musical equipment for worship. Others go to the childrens ministry or youth ministry. But if you are refering to the major institutions, Jesus, never wanted this because of what we see....... Corruption.

The bible was written by many people at different times, and even today revisions are being made. Isn't there a chance that something wasn't written in or that something was misunderstood or that it's all a story and nothing more?

There are no revisions made. There has been long speculation of such, but there is no evidende to support it. The oldest manuscript we had was the Greek Septuagint which shows the a perfect harmony to all translations and dialects. Then, in the early 1900's an amazing discovery was found in the caves of Qumran. An ancient Jewish sect, known as the Essenes, had copies of scrolls back to the time of Isaiah, hidden in alabaster and clay jars. Isaiah was written roughly 2,750 years ago. With this new discovery, it shows quite well the preservation of the original manuscripts.

God loves all right? So why send us to hell if we're bad? I thought he loved us all and forgave our sins?[b/]

God cannot overlook sin. If He did, He would not be holy, or just. However, God in His mercy, knows that mankind cannot keep the whole Law. He instituted sacrifice for atonement that foreshadowed what His intentions were all along. God, on a cross, would become sin, and bore the penalty do us out of mercy and love. Anyone who rejects this 'free gift' cannot partake of His love. He has given us a choice that we either accept or reject. So truly, it is man that condemns Himself, not God.

[b]Really, if there was one God, then everybody should believe in that one specific God, not there own. That shows that nobody not even the church knows the truth, it's all money.

Amen. Everybody should worship the true and living God, not their idols. No one knows the full magnitude of God. But that isn't to say that some don't know God.

I believed in God for years, but when I began to take interest in religion I realized that there are NO hard facts or evidence that any of it is true.[b/]

There are hard facts pointing to God. Perhaps you don't know where to look. Having said that, if you are expecting God to materialize before your eyes and shout, "Here I am!!!", it isn't going to happen. God says we must know and believe in Him through faith. Not blind faith, but faith. If you were just to take my word for it right now, that would be blind faith. But, if what I wrote compeled you to take an honest look, you might find that God is never as far away as we assume.

[b]If God is true then forgive me, but God himself hasn't showed us why we should go his way. Words are nothing these days, empty promises of salvation, still there is something out there that moves us.

He has shown us. He continues to show us through His Word. That is the very reason why it is critical to get into the Word, be devoted in prayer, and bear each others burdens. Getting in right standing with God is the only way to know Him. The more I seek Him, the more I know that we must do things His way. And when we do, all that heartache melts away. Then, you will truly know that everything He says is for a reason and that it was ALWAYS out of your best interests.

Hope that helps.



[This message has been edited by hyroglyphx (edited 11-12-2005).]

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



The unification of the world religions are not as divergent as they sometimes appear. According to more atheistic views, religion evolved or was the invention of humanoids. If this was the case, however, we'd expect to see vast differences from religion to religion. This really isn't the case. Most agree on some major points. Animal sacrifice is one of them... Actually, sacrifice at all. How could unassisted reason ever arrive at the conclusion that God/god/godess are properly worshiped through sacrifice? How could we reasonably assume that 'innocence' is required for atonement, if it were not initially instituted by God? If we say that one group of anthropoids could have stumbled upon this hapazardly, how could we then see such universialty in it? Sacrifice was done not only by the Hebrews, but also Greeks, Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Hindus and Chinese. They all speak of sacrifice long in vogue. This unity of religion on the issue of sacrifice bespeaks revelation and not some evolution.

Likewise, the division of time into 'weeks' of 7 is prevalent among ancients cultures, suggesting the commemoration of creation. The Babylonians observed the 7th and all the following denominations of seven as sacred days and sacred lunar months. It is widely admitted that even before Genesis was penned, it contained elements of traditions that have been around thousands of years prior, passed down verbally.

The belief in the immortality of the soul, or the 'soul' in general is also very telling. And of the soul, that it needs 'regeneration', whether it be through reincarnation or the need to be ritually cleansed of impurity, or of salvation granted by the Creator. The natural world can't account for these things. No power through the light of reason via nature can explain these things.

So it seems that all religion had a starting point. The fact that many point to one thing is something to be considered. Now, which one(s)?



There are hard facts pointing to God. Perhaps you don't know where to look. Having said that, if you are expecting God to materialize before your eyes and shout, "Here I am!!!", it isn't going to happen. God says we must know and believe in Him through faith. Not blind faith, but faith. If you were just to take my word for it right now, that would be blind faith. But, if what I wrote compeled you to take an honest look, you might find that God is never as far away as we assume.



Modern humans only began to migrate out of Africa around 70000 years ago, language first origionated around 100000 years ago. Is it not possible that some of these aspects of religion were already in stories and oral traditions and that could be the source of all these coincidences. The seven day week probably comes from the quarters of the moon. As the moon is becoming farther out it's orbit is approaching 29 days, but it was closer to 28 days than it is now back then, and that could very well have been passed through oral tradition. The earth being the center of the universe was also a common aspect of many beliefs, the Greeks thought the sun was pulled by a chariot around the earth, and Christianity thought the sun revolved around the earth at first too, until it was disproven in the 16th or 17th century. God would not have spread false thoughts through all the people, this is likely due to oral tradition as well. Same with the spirit, and the sacrafice of animals.

What "hard facts" are there pointing to god. I hear this look around thing all the time, and I see hard facts that science and logic would consider hard facts against god, but if there are "hard facts" proving gods existance I would assume you would be able to explain them.

btw, although I may disagree with you all over hydroglyphx I respect you as a poster for having well thought out ideas and good arguments so don't take my disagreements personally.



[This message has been edited by T-BagBikerStar (edited 11-13-2005).]

Modern humans only began to migrate out of Africa around 70000 years ago, language first origionated around 100000 years ago.

What is this based on? I know that many anthropologists believe that the oldest human bone was found in Africa, but that is based on c14 dating which is unreliable.

could be the source of all these coincidences. The seven day week probably comes from the quarters of the moon. As the moon is becoming farther out it's orbit is approaching 29 days, but it was closer to 28 days than it is now back then, and that could very well have been passed through oral tradition.

What about it would make the seventh day more sacred than any other? That's the question. Genesis itself states that stars and moon are used for signs.

Christianity thought the sun revolved around the earth at first too, until it was disproven in the 16th or 17th century.

Everybody thought this, not just Christians.



God would not have spread false thoughts through all the people, this is likely due to oral tradition as well.

What false thought?

What "hard facts" are there pointing to god. I hear this look around thing all the time, and I see hard facts that science and logic would consider hard facts against god, but if there are "hard facts" proving gods existance I would assume you would be able to explain them.

Because all this would have to come about by chance. The number of instances that evrything came about by chance is so astronomically high that it's so improbable, you might as well say that it's impossible. At the base level, we only have two options. Life is either intentional or unintentional. If we can reasonably establish that life is more than a series of 'whoops', then what other choice do we have?

btw, although I may disagree with you all over hydroglyphx I respect you as a poster for having well thought out ideas and good arguments so don't take my disagreements personally.

Well, I thank you... I can safely say the same about you. And no, I don't take it personally. I mean, when people disagree it's going to get a little heated. that goes with territory. I guess as long as we can argue constructively, there is no harm in emotion. It's when the emotion becomes a vessel for something hateful.. Then it becomes a problem.



[This message has been edited by hyroglyphx (edited 11-13-2005).]

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



What is this based on? I know that many anthropologists believe that the oldest human bone was found in Africa, but that is based on c14 dating which is unreliable.

What about it would make the seventh day more sacred than any other? That's the question. Genesis itself states that stars and moon are used for signs.

Everybody thought this, not just Christians.



What false thought?

Because all this would have to come about by chance. The number of instances that evrything came about by chance is so astronomically high that it's so improbable, you might as well say that it's impossible. At the base level, we only have two options. Life is either intentional or unintentional. If we can reasonably establish that life is more than a series of 'whoops', then what other choice do we have?



Carbon14 dating is incredibly reliable, as all living organisms start with a certain amount of this radioactive element in them, and carbon has a known rate of decay, it has a half-life around 5 or 6 thousand years I think, you can determine when something occurred scientifically. I understand that you cannot believe this works if you believe in god as described in the bible because it creates contradictions with what the bible tells you, but it has been tested hundreds of times over and has never given a false reading, so I'd call that accurate. But I guess it could have all been planted there by god if you are willing to believe that. I just hear historians stating the 100000 year thing, then written language was like 7-8 thousand years ago, I don't know how they got it, that's where I got it from though.

The sacredness of the seventh day could have been around beforehand. I don't see why every seventh day couldn't have been celebrated in some way 70000 years ago, and tribes of people migrating around the world have continued this tradition since.

The false idea that the earth was the center of the universe and that the sun revolved around us. Obviously god would not have given everybody in the world this false idea, as you claim happened with the seven day week, and other similarities in religion, and the chances are far too small for this to all have come about by coincidence you claim, it must have spread across the world by some origional tribe who came up with this idea and then it was passed through oral tradition across the globe.

Well, imagining the 13billion years, and the billions of galaxies each containing billions of stars, around which we are now starting to find multiple planets in almost every one we have tested, I would say that the odds of so many coincidences happening are quite likely. Even on earth alone, in the hundred million years it took life to begin after earth formed, that seems like about the amount of time I would expect with all the chemical changes going on on our newborn planet for a self-sustaining and replicating chemical reaction to begin, and once that happens, it is bound as this reaction splits apart for some environmental factors to change and modify it between generations slightly until noticeable changes occur, you have life on earth. Maybe life would not have turned out as we know it, but then that life however it turned out would be wondering, how improbable it is that life turned out how it knows it. Life was destined to turn out somehow and it turned out as it did, we are nothing spectacular.

quote:Originally posted by T-BagBikerStar:

Carbon14 dating is incredibly reliable, as all living organisms start with a certain amount of this radioactive element in them, and carbon has a known rate of decay, it has a half-life around 5 or 6 thousand years I think, you can determine when something occurred scientifically.

This doesn't match up with your own claim of bones dating at 100,000 years. The half life of Carbon is most accepted at about 40-70,000 years. That means, you can't scientifically date past that time because all the carbon would have decayed in the host. Aside from this, the inventor, Willard Libbey himself stated that there has been large atmospheric changes on the last century that would throw off dates radically. That's exactly what we've seen. They have yet to equalize in the atmosphere causing major discrepencies in the dating method. Living penguins have been dated at 8,000 years old. A shell of a living snail, dated at 27,000 years old. A frozen mammoth was dated as well. To detect any discrepencies, they sent different portions of the mammoth to different labs and at different intervals. One leg was dated at 40,000 years, another was dtaed at 26,000 years. The surrounding wood that was lying adjacent to the mammoth was dated at 10,000 years. In response to these apparent abnormalitites, a Canadian Science journal reads: "The troubles with radio carbon dating are undeniably deep and serious. Half of the dates are rejected. these gross discrepencies are nothing more than selected dates."

What does that mean? That means that evolutionary biologists select dates to fit the evolutionary profile of the man-made 'geologic column'. This column, is in and of itself, a problem, replete with many anomoles that need to be looked at again.

The sacredness of the seventh day could have been around beforehand. I don't see why every seventh day couldn't have been celebrated in some way 70000 years ago, and tribes of people migrating around the world have continued this tradition since.

This is a guess based on no merit whatsoever. They just assume the migratory patterns of many tribes. Just like they assume on Discovery what dinosaurs used to sound like. There is no verifiable data proving this. They just make things up that seem reasonable. For the sake of curiosity, that is fine. But, it's a whole other thing to pawn it off as scientific fact, when it isn't based on any fact at all!

The false idea that the earth was the center of the universe and that the sun revolved around us. As I pointed out earlier, the entire world that thought the earth was the center of the universe. But if you want some scripture that predates Galileo by 1,750 years, I will provide some:

The earth is a sphere

"He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth." Isaiah 40:22

Gravity (3,000 years before Newton)

""He stretches out the north over empty space; He suspends the earth of nothing." Job 26:7

Well, imagining the 13billion years, and the billions of galaxies each containing billions of stars, around which we are now starting to find multiple planets in almost every one we have tested, I would say that the odds of so many coincidences happening are quite likely. Even on earth alone, in the hundred million years it took life to begin after earth formed, that seems like about the amount of time I would expect with all the chemical changes going on on our newborn planet for a self-sustaining and replicating chemical reaction to begin, and once that happens, it is bound as this reaction splits apart for some environmental factors to change and modify it between generations slightly until noticeable changes occur, you have life on earth. Maybe life would not have turned out as we know it, but then that life however it turned out would be wondering, how improbable it is that life turned out how it knows it. Life was destined to turn out somehow and it turned out as it did, we are nothing spectacular.

Here's the thing:

The earth is so perfectly situated to support life that if the earth 5% closer, we would burn up and all water would evaporate. If we were 10% further away, all water would freeze, including the water that comprises 70% of our bodies.

The earths magnetic field is weakening with time at a measurable rate. The earth was as old as many claim. It would be completely gone otherwise, unless you can tell me why it started to decrease so rapidly lately. The earth revolves at an estimate of 1,000 mph, but it is slowing 1/1,000 seconds per day. That means it used to spin much faster But if the earth is millions of years old, it would have spun at an excess of 5,000 mph due to the Corealis Effect. The centrifugal force also would have thrown us into the atmosphere. So you see, the earth can't be millions or even 100,000 years old. So these are 3 reasons why I seriously doubt the commonly accepted age of the earth. These are just 3 of many, many reasons.

ok, first thing, explain to me how c14 dating is unreliable? c14 dating has a margin of error, but it isn't unreliable.

also alot more isotopic tests are applied to remains than just c14.

also, genetic studies have proved without doubt that all humans have a common ancestry which originates in africa.

as for the 7th day, yes, exactly WHAT makes the 7th day more sacred than the others? also your forgetting the other religions that don't think sunday is "SACRED"

yes, everybody did think this, science proved it wrong, everyone then stopped thinking it, apart from christians, because it disagreed with their dogmas.

what false thought? how about the great flood, jonah and the whale, tower of babel, a whole load of "miracles" jesus coming back from the dead. god, etc.

as for the issue of chance. i think you are an idiot. our brains including your brain is equipped to deal with chance on an every day level and a everyday timescale. no one can intuitively judge the chance of something like the first organisms arising out of water rich in organic molecules.

simply because the timescales (1 billion years) and the number of molecules (many many billions) are simply too large for you to use your everyday intuition of how likely something is. if you use mathematics to accurately work the chances out, i think you'd find that the emergence of life would actually be quite likely.

although i disagree with you completely, you are about twice my age and should be by now able to understand the world around you.

understand the world around you, read more science, and less bible, then i'll start to respect you.

Well lets start with these three...

quote:Originally posted by hydroglyphx:



This doesn't match up with your own claim of bones dating at 100,000 years. The half life of Carbon is most accepted at about 40-70,000 years. That means, you can't scientifically date past that time because all the carbon would have decayed in the host. Aside from this, the inventor, Willard Libbey himself stated that there has been large atmospheric changes on the last century that would throw off dates radically. That's exactly what we've seen. They have yet to equalize in the atmosphere causing major discrepencies in the dating method. Living penguins have been dated at 8,000 years old. A shell of a living snail, dated at 27,000 years old. A frozen mammoth was dated as well. To detect any discrepencies, they sent different portions of the mammoth to different labs and at different intervals. One leg was dated at 40,000 years, another was dtaed at 26,000 years. The surrounding wood that was lying adjacent to the mammoth was dated at 10,000 years. In response to these apparent abnormalitites, a Canadian Science journal reads: "The troubles with radio carbon dating are undeniably deep and serious. Half of the dates are rejected. these gross discrepencies are nothing more than selected dates."

What does that mean? That means that evolutionary biologists select dates to fit the evolutionary profile of the man-made 'geologic column'. This column, is in and of itself, a problem, replete with many anomoles that need to be looked at again.



From wikipedia, "Carbon-14 has a half-life of 5730 years" Carbon-14 does not disappear from an organism in 40-70 thousand years, it simply becomes too small of an amount to measure, half-life is the amount of time it takes for the amount of remaining C-14 to cut in half, so if you continue halving the total amount, it will never necessarily completely disappear, but you were right in that C-14 dating could not be used accurately beyond 60,000 years, I merely assumed this because you mentioned it was used to find bone dates origionally. From wikipedia: "The K-Ar and uranium decay series are used in dating older objects (see Radiometric dating)."

You really have a serious problem with disbelieving science, what reason would any scientist have for making up such results?? Science is very carful about false data, and punishes mistakes heavily by making a fool out of such scientists future career when they purposely make such mistakes to fit past diagrams. About your varying levels of C-14, "The raw BP date cannot be used directly as a calendar date, because the assumption that the level of 14C absorption remains constant does not hold true in practice. The level is maintained by high energy particles interacting with the earth's upper atmosphere, which may be affected by changes in the earth's magnetic field or in the cosmic ray background, e.g. variations caused by solar storms. In addition there are substantial reservoirs of carbon in organic matter, the ocean, ocean sediments (see methane hydrate), and sedimentary rocks; and changing climate can sometimes disrupt the carbon flow between these reservoirs and the atmosphere. The level has also been affected by human activities -- it was almost doubled for a short period due to atomic bomb tests in the 1950s and 1960s and has been reduced by the release of large amounts of CO2 from ancient organic sources where 14C is not present -- the fossil fuels used in industry and transportation."

The BP dates are therefore calibrated to give calendar dates. Standard calibration curves are available, based on comparison of radiocarbon dates with other methods such as examination of tree growth rings (dendrochronology), ice cores, deep ocean sediment cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples, and speleothems (cave deposits)."

I looked at several different calibration scales from the past few years, and they all seem quite accurate, they have hundreds of points plotted to show slight changes of a few hundred years over time, the curves are larger in modern times and smoothe out in the past, they get each value from what has been saved in things like glaciers and whatnot over time, and they plot this out very carefully over time, not made up.



quote:Originally posted by hydroglyphx:



This is a guess based on no merit whatsoever. They just assume the migratory patterns of many tribes. Just like they assume on Discovery what dinosaurs used to sound like. There is no verifiable data proving this. They just make things up that seem reasonable. For the sake of curiosity, that is fine. But, it's a whole other thing to pawn it off as scientific fact, when it isn't based on any fact at all!

The false idea that the earth was the center of the universe and that the sun revolved around us. As I pointed out earlier, the entire world that thought the earth was the center of the universe. But if you want some scripture that predates Galileo by 1,750 years, I will provide some:

The earth is a sphere

"He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth." Isaiah 40:22

Gravity (3,000 years before Newton)

""He stretches out the north over empty space; He suspends the earth of nothing." Job 26:7



Well, no I bet they can prove migratory patterns pretty well from the traces of bones and whatnot left behind, even Christianity assumes we migrated out of Africa/middle east region, just follow the trails of bones and remains left behind buried well underground, and you can trace some of human migration at least in the times we are referring to. They can guess well what dinosaurs sounded like by comparing their vocal areas to those of living organisms, and guess pretty well, it's not perfect, you give me a cat skeleton I wouldn't necessarily draw a cat, but I could get the shape right, and give it to an expert and they could get even closer.

Yes, the whole world's believing the sun revolves around the earth was a key part of my point, I acknowledged this from the beginning, if gravity and the fact that the earth is a sphere was written in your scripture, why did the church not believe it until it was proven against them??

quote:

Here's the thing:

The earth is so perfectly situated to support life that if the earth 5% closer, we would burn up and all water would evaporate. If we were 10% further away, all water would freeze, including the water that comprises 70% of our bodies.

The earths magnetic field is weakening with time at a measurable rate. The earth was as old as many claim. It would be completely gone otherwise, unless you can tell me why it started to decrease so rapidly lately. The earth revolves at an estimate of 1,000 mph, but it is slowing 1/1,000 seconds per day. That means it used to spin much faster But if the earth is millions of years old, it would have spun at an excess of 5,000 mph due to the Corealis Effect. The centrifugal force also would have thrown us into the atmosphere. So you see, the earth can't be millions or even 100,000 years old. So these are 3 reasons why I seriously doubt the commonly accepted age of the earth. These are just 3 of many, many reasons.



Yes, these are perfect reasons why we can expect life on earth to turn out as we know it, so maybe a small percentage of solar systems have planets in a zone that would create life based upon water, if all life relies upon water, but knowing the number of galaxies and systems, such planets must not only exist, but should be expected to exist by the billions or even trillions! And to think that life could not have developed in such a way in such an expansive universe is unthinkable.

quote:Originally posted by TerminatorVinitiatoR:

ok, first thing, explain to me how c14 dating is unreliable? c14 dating has a margin of error, but it isn't unreliable.

also alot more isotopic tests are applied to remains than just c14.

I would call millions of years of a discrepency more than a margin of error. Aside from this, the criteria of 'science' is to have the SAME outcome every time. If it isn't, that is the very defintion of unscientific. Therefore, it should not be used. Besides, as I pointed out, you can only carbon date on living, or once living, well-preserved specimens. Nothing past 40-70,000 years. That throws out 90% of the dinosaurs that supposedly go past that time.

also, genetic studies have proved without doubt that all humans have a common ancestry which originates in africa.

Genetic studies prove that all mankind from two people. How you are supposed to deduce where they were born via genome research is physical mystery to me.

as for the 7th day, yes, exactly WHAT makes the 7th day more sacred than the others? also your forgetting the other religions that don't think sunday is "SACRED"

Not that I think the 7th day is more sacred than any other. My mention of it has to do with the unity of religions, which is the premise of the post. My showing that the 7th day in many cultures and tribes is a way of showing that man was divinely inspired from the beginning. Otherwise, we would see no correlation from one to another. As it is, most religions parallel another one.

what false thought? how about the great flood, jonah and the whale, tower of babel, a whole load of "miracles" jesus coming back from the dead. god, etc.

Being that neither saw Jesus raise from the dead neither confirms nor disconfirms the possibility. But as far as Jonah, we at least know it's humanly possible.





as for the issue of chance. i think you are an idiot. our brains including your brain is equipped to deal with chance on an every day level and a everyday timescale. no one can intuitively judge the chance of something like the first organisms arising out of water rich in organic molecules.

simply because the timescales (1 billion years) and the number of molecules (many many billions) are simply too large for you to use your everyday intuition of how likely something is. if you use mathematics to accurately work the chances out, i think you'd find that the emergence of life would actually be quite likely.

Actually, you're dead wrong. Mathematically, the probablity that even one paramecium can arrange molecules without an outside force necessitating the action thereof is 1 in 10 to the billionth power. To help aggrandize the enormity of this improbablity, 10 to the 50th power is considered, absolute zero. Aside from this, let's just look at the obvious. If life is nothing more than random chaos, how is it logically possible that in all this disorder, it never seems to lend itself to catastrophe? Why is that disorder always seems to bring about such good things, even though it's in direct contrast with the immutable 1st and 2nd law of thermodynamics?

although i disagree with you completely, you are about twice my age and should be by now able to understand the world around you.

So, you're 14 years old?

understand the world around you, read more science, and less bible, then i'll start to respect you.

I think I sufficiently put you in your place. Perhaps you should heed your own advice, dust off your Bible and your textbooks. they aren't paper weights. Thanks.



[This message has been edited by hyroglyphx (edited 11-14-2005).]

From wikipedia, "Carbon-14 has a half-life of 5730 years" Carbon-14 does not disappear from an organism in 40-70 thousand years, it simply becomes too small of an amount to measure, half-life is the amount of time it takes for the amount of remaining C-14 to cut in half, so if you continue halving the total amount, it will never necessarily completely disappear, but you were right in that C-14 dating could not be used accurately beyond 60,000 years, I merely assumed this because you mentioned it was used to find bone dates origionally. From wikipedia: "The K-Ar and uranium decay series are used in dating older objects (see Radiometric dating)."

What I said was is you can't date anything past 40-70,000 years. That's being overly generous for the reasons you just listed.

You really have a serious problem with disbelieving science, what reason would any scientist have for making up such results??

Who says I have a problem with science???? I have a problem when scientists don't use science, and then call it science. I have an enormous problem with that! Shouldn't we all?

I have a problem with science, falsely so-called...

Science is very carful about false data, and punishes mistakes heavily by making a fool out of such scientists future career when they purposely make such mistakes to fit past diagrams.

I don't know about 'punishing' those who purport false claims. I have, conversely, seen the opposite.. I've seen them praise one another.

About your varying levels of C-14, "The raw BP date cannot be used directly as a calendar date, because the assumption that the level of 14C absorption remains constant does not hold true in practice. The level is maintained by high energy particles interacting with the earth's upper atmosphere, which may be affected by changes in the earth's magnetic field or in the cosmic ray background, e.g. variations caused by solar storms. In addition there are substantial reservoirs of carbon in organic matter, the ocean, ocean sediments (see methane hydrate), and sedimentary rocks; and changing climate can sometimes disrupt the carbon flow between these reservoirs and the atmosphere.

Uh huh... And didn't I just say that Willard Libbey, the inventor, understood this? I said that the atmosphere has not yet reached equilibrium. That will throw off the dates. As well, nuclear and other radiological testing has had adverse effects on the testing, not to mention, overall pollution.

The level has also been affected by human activities -- it was almost doubled for a short period due to atomic bomb tests in the 1950s and 1960s and has been reduced by the release of large amounts of CO2 from ancient organic sources where 14C is not present -- the fossil fuels used in industry and transportation."

Exactly. So that's a problem...

The BP dates are therefore calibrated to give calendar dates. Standard calibration curves are available, based on comparison of radiocarbon dates with other methods such as examination of tree growth rings (dendrochronology), ice cores, deep ocean sediment cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples, and speleothems (cave deposits)."

Funny you should mention dendrochronology, because that is one of the few good testing methods, that will give you a very good ballpark figure. But, the oldest tree in the world is just over 5,000 years, when the earth was being repopulated after the deluge.

As far as ice core testing is concerned, the formula, just like some isochron methods wer flawed from the beginning by making assumptions of an old earth to begin with. Glaciologists expected to see 100,000 year cycles, and from the beginning of the ice pack, assumed that's what the starting point was.

I looked at several different calibration scales from the past few years, and they all seem quite accurate, they have hundreds of points plotted to show slight changes of a few hundred years over time, the curves are larger in modern times and smoothe out in the past, they get each value from what has been saved in things like glaciers and whatnot over time, and they plot this out very carefully over time, not made up.

There have been found, in well into the Arctic circle, huge coniferous trees, as well as animals that can only be found in tropical weather. This is very suggestive that the earth was not initially frozen, but became frozen after the fact.

Well, no I bet they can prove migratory patterns pretty well from the traces of bones and whatnot left behind, even Christianity assumes we migrated out of Africa/middle east region, just follow the trails of bones and remains left behind buried well underground, and you can trace some of human migration at least in the times we are referring to.

No, all they can guess is that two original humans' ancestors migrated. Aside from that, you can't tell what part of the world. My guess would be Mesopotamia, not Africa.



They can guess well what dinosaurs sounded like by comparing their vocal areas to those of living organisms, and guess pretty well, it's not perfect, you give me a cat skeleton I wouldn't necessarily draw a cat, but I could get the shape right, and give it to an expert and they could get even closer.

Here's the problem... All you have is a skeleton. Often, not even a full one. There is no 'vocal area to look at, because it was soft tissue that is all but dissolved. You have an empty thoracic region that can tell us nothing. It's just a guess. And if you were to compare it to modern day reptiles, please tell me which one's growl with ferocity? None of them. If anything, they hiss. Dinosaurs probably hissed, not let out these deep, gutteral bellows as many suggest. It would be cool if they did, and it certainly isn't impossible. My reason for mentioning it, is that it is a guess. And it's based on absolutely nothing.

Yes, the whole world's believing the sun revolves around the earth was a key part of my point, I acknowledged this from the beginning, if gravity and the fact that the earth is a sphere was written in your scripture, why did the church not believe it until it was proven against them??

I don't know. I don't hopw they thought or why they thought as they did. That would be a very large assumption on my part. But if I had to guess, it is an obscure passage.



[/QUOTE][/b]

Yes, these are perfect reasons why we can expect life on earth to turn out as we know it, so maybe a small percentage of solar systems have planets in a zone that would create life based upon water, if all life relies upon water, but knowing the number of galaxies and systems, such planets must not only exist, but should be expected to exist by the billions or even trillions! And to think that life could not have developed in such a way in such an expansive universe is unthinkable.[/b]

I will certainly grant you that, but this does not take in to account the fact that life doesn't come from non-life. Here's the theory of the Big Bang. Nothing exploded and here we are. That is an atheistic version of Creatio ex nihilo (Creation out of nothing), to which they call a religious belief. The difference would be? Abiogenesis is a physical impossibility. Something always comes from something else. We always procreate... Only God can create.

Originally posted by TerminatorVinitiatoR:

ok, first thing, explain to me how c14 dating is unreliable? c14 dating has a margin of error, but it isn't unreliable.

also alot more isotopic tests are applied to remains than just c14.

I would call millions of years of a discrepency more than a margin of error. Aside from this, the criteria of 'science' is to have the SAME outcome every time. If it isn't, that is the very defintion of unscientific. Therefore, it should not be used. Besides, as I pointed out, you can only carbon date on living, or once living, well-preserved specimens. Nothing past 40-70,000 years. That throws out 90% of the dinosaurs that supposedly go past that time.



No, scientists attempt to use carbon dating on things millions of years old, that is other types of dating they are using, as the sample becomes too small at that period of time. I read on christainanswers.net some of the examples you were reading about. Obviously it couldn't be carbon dating because they were siting examples of rocks and things and it states above that carbon dating only works in living organisms. However, you deny their whole argument because scientists simply used the excuse of contamination for having one date not match up. Aside from the fact that they have had thousands of dates work in a single fashion before, all leading to the same pattern. Then they find this one sample, where the areas around it do not give an accurate date, and I would expect them to search a larger area first to see if they can get a more accurate reading from that, but that is not the case, because an area has been contaminated, either by human factors or natural changes in the earth, and so they begin to try to use other tools to find out a better date, which they manage to do to find a proper date, and once they do, they go back to their origional samples from the area and are able to see where their mistakes were made, no faulty or made up science there.

By the way, you're obviously a bit off on your commonly accepted history of the world as 100% of dinosaur ages can't be found from radiocarbon dating as dinosaurs existed before 65million years ago, but we can use other dating methods, and there is far less contamination for those when we are picking out samples buried in rocks for 65-200million years, rocks don't get contaminated often, and scientists can carefully transport them without getting interfered with.

As it is not 100% I would not use radioactive dating as a foolproof proof against Christianity, but in no way can you say that science is not accurate because of this or that the commonly accepted view of the earths development is wrong.



also, genetic studies have proved without doubt that all humans have a common ancestry which originates in africa.

Genetic studies prove that all mankind from two people. How you are supposed to deduce where they were born via genome research is physical mystery to me.



Well, I think this goes back to finding bones in Africa, then calculating the number of genetic mutations between those bones and modern humans and determining age from that, it's no proof at all.



as for the 7th day, yes, exactly WHAT makes the 7th day more sacred than the others? also your forgetting the other religions that don't think sunday is "SACRED"

Not that I think the 7th day is more sacred than any other. My mention of it has to do with the unity of religions, which is the premise of the post. My showing that the 7th day in many cultures and tribes is a way of showing that man was divinely inspired from the beginning. Otherwise, we would see no correlation from one to another. As it is, most religions parallel another one.



Came from oral tradition, reality of sacredicity not an issue.



what false thought? how about the great flood, jonah and the whale, tower of babel, a whole load of "miracles" jesus coming back from the dead. god, etc.

Being that neither saw Jesus raise from the dead neither confirms nor disconfirms the possibility. But as far as Jonah, we at least know it's humanly possible. http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/n/newjonah.htm



as for the issue of chance. i think you are an idiot. our brains including your brain is equipped to deal with chance on an every day level and a everyday timescale. no one can intuitively judge the chance of something like the first organisms arising out of water rich in organic molecules.

simply because the timescales (1 billion years) and the number of molecules (many many billions) are simply too large for you to use your everyday intuition of how likely something is. if you use mathematics to accurately work the chances out, i think you'd find that the emergence of life would actually be quite likely.

Actually, you're dead wrong. Mathematically, the probablity that even one paramecium can arrange molecules without an outside force necessitating the action thereof is 1 in 10 to the billionth power. To help aggrandize the enormity of this improbablity, 10 to the 50th power is considered, absolute zero. Aside from this, let's just look at the obvious. If life is nothing more than random chaos, how is it logically possible that in all this disorder, it never seems to lend itself to catastrophe? Why is that disorder always seems to bring about such good things, even though it's in direct contrast with the immutable 1st and 2nd law of thermodynamics?



This number you got I find highly disturbing. How would you get such a number?? Perhaps if you view it as life just popping out of nowhere through the random movements of atoms or small molecules, but if I think of simply a chemical reaction starting that is capable of duplicating itself, I don't think it would be so difficult, and then evolution is able to take place. Actually, I don't think that number you gave fits, it would be 1 / 10^1billion for it to occur in the whole history of the universe, that's wrong, you'd need to give an area and time period over which that number holds for it to work as a fact. Just imagining calculating that 10^1,000,000,000 there isn't any single thing inside the cell in your single calculation that is that unlikely that you could be aware of, maybe a single protein forming as one thing, we've done that in test labs with early earth materials, I'd say 1/10^3 for 100 proteins per second, per mol of early earth supplies, and you'd have to add those 3s together, because that's what happens when you multiply exponents until you get 1billion?? I don't know who's putting in all the data to calculate that.



although i disagree with you completely, you are about twice my age and should be by now able to understand the world around you.



You dumbfuck, why would you put that into your argument?? it was bad already, why kill it completely?



So, you're 14 years old?



tsk



understand the world around you, read more science, and less bible, then i'll start to respect you.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I think I sufficiently put you in your place. Perhaps you should heed your own advice, dust off your Bible and your textbooks. they aren't paper weights. Thanks.

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:

I think I sufficiently put you in your place. Perhaps you should heed your own advice, dust off your Bible and your textbooks. they aren't paper weights. Thanks.



how about heeding some hard facts IDIOT!

like i said, they use lots of OTHER ISOTOPES to measure the age of organic matter.

you seem to completely NOT KNOW the method of isotopic dating. learn something about it, then we can discuss margins of error.

ok maybe dinosoars are as you say far too ancient to be subject to accurate isotope tests, but you CAN roughly estimate how long it took for the sediment above the bones to accumulate, you can read the geological record like a book.

also, alternating magnetic strips on the oceanic crust of the atlantic PROVE that the earth is ancient and europe and america were one continent.

AND i did not say mankind originates from 2 people, this is scientifically impossible, humanity would have in-bred itself into oblivion a few generations later.

ok, how do you explain that white people have the exact gene for black skin, a dna section that codes for the protein melanin, except that it is just "switched off" in white people by another gene which "cancels" the order?

the ammount of proof for the truth is limited by how hard you want to look, i expect more and more evidence is accumulating to corroborate what i am saying.

ok, like you say, you don't think the 7th day is any more sacred than the other days, kinda proves my point. also its not much of a coincidence that judaism christianity and islam think the seventh day is sacred, they are basically the same religion.

the fact that jesus was raised from the dead is in the bible and is celebrated by christians as a holy day, proves the falseness of the bible and christianity, no one can be raised from the dead.

jonah is also complete bullshit.

on that link you posted the man fell into the sea, and the whale was eventually harpooned THE SAME DAY, and cut open.

also this completely disproves the story:

"More damaging to the story was a letter written by the wife of the captain of the 'Star of the East,' Mrs John Killam.

The contents of her letter were published in 1907 in 'The Expository Times' by a reader who had corresponded with Mrs Killam about the whale story.

She said, "There is not one word of truth to the whale story. I was with my husband all the years he was in the Star of the East. There was never a man lost overboard while my husband was with her. The sailor has told a great sea yarn."

hahahah disproved, anyway it is shear lunacy to think that someone could be swallowed by a whale(which feed on krill) survive the crushing pressures at great depths, lack of air, strong stomach acid, and be spat out alive and well after a month!!!!

if you think this is possible, i class you as an idiot.

"probablity that even one paramecium can arrange molecules without an outside force necessitating the action thereof is 1 in 10 to the billionth power."

explaining science is not about overcomplicated ramblings. that sentance doesn't make any sense.

"1 in 10 to the billionth power" yes this number may be true, (i know its not true, no one can really know) but if you give it enough time, and enough collisions betwean organic molecules you might well happen on a system which can reproduce itself.

if you understood reproduction a bit more in detail, you would begin to understand the true beauty of life.

oh man there is so much to explain to you i am bursting to do it, but it will take a long time.

and no i thought you were a lot older than you are.

I will certainly grant you that, but this does not take in to account the fact that life doesn't come from non-life. Here's the theory of the Big Bang. Nothing exploded and here we are. That is an atheistic version of Creatio ex nihilo (Creation out of nothing), to which they call a religious belief. The difference would be? Abiogenesis is a physical impossibility. Something always comes from something else. We always procreate... Only God can create.



I will only reply to this for now, as I feel my last post responded to the rest of your post fairly well, some clearing up to do still I bet.

Just because science hasn't been able to explain the big bang yet, I would not view it in the same way. There are infact several theories on how the universe first origionated all leading back to the first 10^-20 to 10^-43 seconds after the big bang as identical to the standard big bang model, but then varying in some way to change such an impossibility. I'm currently reading a book on theoretical physics by a professor at Colombia University, explaining several of these possibilities, so although it is not explained for sure, science has laid out several possibilities for these first few moments that avoid things that are impossible such as that.

No, scientists attempt to use carbon dating on things millions of years old, that is other types of dating they are using, as the sample becomes too small at that period of time. I read on christainanswers.net some of the examples you were reading about. Obviously it couldn't be carbon dating because they were siting examples of rocks and things and it states above that carbon dating only works in living organisms. However, you deny their whole argument because scientists simply used the excuse of contamination for having one date not match up. Aside from the fact that they have had thousands of dates work in a single fashion before, all leading to the same pattern. Then they find this one sample, where the areas around it do not give an accurate date, and I would expect them to search a larger area first to see if they can get a more accurate reading from that, but that is not the case, because an area has been contaminated, either by human factors or natural changes in the earth, and so they begin to try to use other tools to find out a better date, which they manage to do to find a proper date, and once they do, they go back to their origional samples from the area and are able to see where their mistakes were made, no faulty or made up science there.

Not even a half an hour ago you were telling me how pefect the dates they get, everytime. I'm showing you that there are some serious discrepencies that unbiased sources, (i.e. not Christiananswers) will clearly state. Look, you can't call something science if it doesn't match up. First, you formulate a hypothesis, then you test the hypothesis, then you have to have reconcilable recurrances, everytime. you have to have a predictable outcome everytime, otherwise that isn't science. The C14 is a very, very good theory in principle and sometimes you get a good average... But this is a tool, not the be-all end-all. And I pointing out this as just one reference of isochron being problematic.

By the way, you're obviously a bit off on your commonly accepted history of the world as 100% of dinosaur ages can't be found from radiocarbon dating as dinosaurs existed before 65million years ago, but we can use other dating methods, and there is far less contamination for those when we are picking out samples buried in rocks for 65-200million years, rocks don't get contaminated often, and scientists can carefully transport them without getting interfered with.

No, that isn't always the case. The animal has to ingest the radiometric substance, somehow to get it into it's body. So if you are using the Potassium-argon method (potassium decays into argon), then the creature has to have it in the body for starters. But yes, I agree that other radiometric dating is more reliable. This was never the issue. The issue is with C14 which you continually seem to want to argue over. I think I've more than presented a good argument against it.

As it is not 100% I would not use radioactive dating as a foolproof proof against Christianity, but in no way can you say that science is not accurate because of this or that the commonly accepted view of the earths development is wrong.



Why do you keep mentioning Christianity when we are talking about science. The quarrel it seems with many evolutionists is that the Bible is going to be taught alongside Creationism. this isn't the case. Most Creationists believe that the Bible is corroborated with true science, but trust me, there are many types of Creationists. Some, who don't believe in the Bible at all. I'm just telling you that there is a mind behind all that is. We could argue the semantics of theology, but it isn't it's place. I think you and other evolutioists think that Creation science consists of sitting around reading Genesis. It isn't. The Bible is not a science textbook, nor should it be employed as such, or thought of, as such. Creationism should be based on science alone. But if it ends up supporting the Bible, then great... All the better.

[/b]Well, I think this goes back to finding bones in Africa, then calculating the number of genetic mutations between those bones and modern humans and determining age from that, it's no proof at all.[/b]

Yes, but we find bones all over the world. My issue was that they were using C14 dating to determine that. But as I pointed out, C14 is probably the most unreliable of all the other radiometric dating. Besides this, they seem to change their tune alot. One year, the oldest is in France. Another, the oldest is in Africa. The next, the oldest is in Canada. All the while professing tiself to be empirical science. This is why I take much of what they have to say with a grain of salt.

as for the 7th day, yes, exactly WHAT makes the 7th day more sacred than the others? also your forgetting the other religions that don't think sunday is "SACRED"

Sunday is not the seventh day. Sunday is the first day. Saturday is the Sabbath. The Catholic church changed it many centuries ago.

[/b]This number you got I find highly disturbing. How would you get such a number?? Perhaps if you view it as life just popping out of nowhere through the random movements of atoms or small molecules, but if I think of simply a chemical reaction starting that is capable of duplicating itself, I don't think it would be so difficult, and then evolution is able to take place. Actually, I don't think that number you gave fits, it would be 1 / 10^1billion for it to occur in the whole history of the universe, that's wrong, you'd need to give an area and time period over which that number holds for it to work as a fact. Just imagining calculating that 10^1,000,000,000 there isn't any single thing inside the cell in your single calculation that is that unlikely that you could be aware of, maybe a single protein forming as one thing, we've done that in test labs with early earth materials, I'd say 1/10^3 for 100 proteins per second, per mol of early earth supplies, and you'd have to add those 3s together, because that's what happens when you multiply exponents until you get 1billion?? I don't know who's putting in all the data to calculate that.[/b]

No one has ever been able to duplicate life. But being that even single-celled organisms are highly complex, it stands to reason that chance doesn't fit into it. It takes 20 amino acids (all of which are extremely complex) just to form one protein. It takes 5 specific kinds of protein (all of which are extremely complex) just to make one single molecule. And being that no one, even under pristine laboratory conditions can do it, tells me that 'nothing' surely can't do it.

You're a good poster and I see that you are actually thinking about these things instead of giving coined responses. I, however, have to go home now... I will be on tomorrow at about the same time. I really enjoyed the debate. I hope we can continue it tomorrow.

I'll get to you tomorrow Terminator. You've got some good posts too. Even though you don't like what I say, there's no need to get hostile. What did you expect on a forum? Complete and total unity?

*to be continued*

Until then, huggles 'n' kisses....

lol, well I've got a full day to come up with a really good response then.

quote:Originally posted by 00258:

I do believe that something created us (Humans). Aside from what I believe I have some questions about "God" and religion that most people cannot answer to me:

*Why are there many religions with different Gods? Which God is "God?

The bible answer is:

"We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. " 1Corinthians 8:4-6

To put it plainly, there is only one God and one Lord. The Father and the Son. The rest if for you to accept or reject. The rest of the answer turns to deceptive practices of the devil but we can't get there until one first comes to faith.

quote:

*Why does the church make so much damn money? Millions of dollars are donated, what happens to all that money?

The money is a tythe. Some give 10 percent of their income some give more and some less. But, this money is for the work of the church who serves God by evangelism through missions or local outreach. Of course some have turned towards "Judas" and abused this purpose for personal gain. This of course confuses or angers people and for good reason.

quote:

*The bible was written by many people at different times, and even today revisions are being made. Isn't there a chance that something wasn't written in or that something was misunderstood or that it's all a story and nothing more?

In some cases the words have changed to appear more modern. 16th century english isn't used anymore nor do many people speak aramic or Greek so some updates are made. This of course does change the structures of sentences and so which sometimes changes the meaning.

The things to keep in mind are the completeness of the work. It isn't to focus on a certain translation but to see the heart of the meassage or "plan of salvation" intact throughout them all is evidence of divinity. No other human work was written over a period of thousands of years to piece together God's plan of salvation. If you study the bible you will see different writing styles and different eras but you may also see the entire structure of the human spirit portrayed through parables and accounts of divine intervention.

You will see a complete story starting with the begining of time itself and how it will end. The focus shouldn't be on the many translations but the continuity of the Gospel and "God's plan of salvation" for mankind.

quote:

*God loves all right? So why send us to hell if we're bad? I thought he loved us all and forgave our sins?

God doesn't send us to hell..we send ourselves.

quote:

*Really, if there was one God, then everybody should believe in that one specific God, not there own. That shows that nobody not even the church knows the truth, it's all money.

There is an enemy to God and his purpose is to sway as many people away from God by whatever means he can imagine. One of his tricks is to create false religions who promote and worship false or lesser gods.

quote:

Simple questions.

I believed in God for years, but when I began to take interest in religion I realized that there are NO hard facts or evidence that any of it is true.

If God is true then forgive me, but God himself hasn't showed us why we should go his way. Words are nothing these days, empty promises of salvation, still there is something out there that moves us.

I see that religion is a dead end for faith. As one is forced into religious doctrines and dogmas they will soon find themselves bowing down to man made rules and regulations of an organization and believe that living in obediance to those rituals is what will lead them into heaven.

This is false.

Following rules has their points and purposes but without faith it's just another snare for the human spirit.

God is true but what He wants is relationship and not religion.

Thank you Hyroglyphx. If you think about it, aren't most people going in the way of blind faith? To believe because, well, everybody says somethings out there, right?

We shouldn't look at death as the end, but as a phase...like mid life crisis.

Stage 1: Organism life (Sperm)

Stage 2: Human life.

Stage 3: What we call death. Could be the Spirit life or WHO KNOWS? lol. It's a journey.



[This message has been edited by 00258 (edited 11-13-2005).]

like i said, they use lots of OTHER ISOTOPES to measure the age of organic matter.

you seem to completely NOT KNOW the method of isotopic dating. learn something about it, then we can discuss margins of error.

I know very well that there are various kinds of radiometric and isochron dating methods. In fact, I gave some references. The issue was specifically about C14, and I addressed those issues. We could use Thorium .230 or Potassium-Argon, or whatever, but I was addresing Carbon at this particular time, because that was the method used for most of the alleged dates. But I'll give you an instance where Potassium 40 dating has failed. This method is ideal for dating igneous rock. During the Mount St. Helens eruption, volcanologists tested the lava after it had cooled. The 'fresh' lava was dated at 2.8 million years. Had they not just watched it flow in a single afternoon, this would have stood meritoriously and unchecked or challenged. These are the types of discrepencies that need to be continually challenged so that we are dealing with true science, not whatever the hell someone with an agenda wants.

ok maybe dinosoars are as you say far too ancient to be subject to accurate isotope tests, but you CAN roughly estimate how long it took for the sediment above the bones to accumulate, you can read the geological record like a book.

No, dinosaurs aren;t too old to date. that's my whole point. They are a few thousand years old, not millions.

The sediment you are refering to is the 'geologic coumn'. The premise is that due to errosion, sediment will pile up slowly. This is, for the most part, a true statement. We see that very well. But a problem emerges that seemingly few take into account. Here's one instance: A trillobyte is said to be an index fossil of 650 million years old. They say, that modern man has evolved from about 2 to 3 million years. Much to the chagrin of certain paleontologists, a human footprint was found fossilized on top of the Trillobyte, clearly killing it. What's worse, the sediment found on top of the Trillobyte with the human footprint was dated at 570 million years. So, somehow, a 650 million year old creature was stepped on and killed by a human 648,000,000 years earlier in soil that was 8 million years younger. That doesn't make much sense, does it? What did they do? They just said, 'Well, it just looks like a human footprint. It must have been a dinosaur." Problem still.... If you look on the graph for the geologic column, there shouldn't be any large Saurians 650 million years ago. And that still doesn't explain why it was in soil younger than itself. How can a creature embed itself in soil that never existed prior to that point? Answer: The dating methods are flawed and have been from the beginning. Can they give good dates? Yes. But if they have a deplorable track record thus far, why would anyone feel compelled to truly believe what they have to say?

also, alternating magnetic strips on the oceanic crust of the atlantic PROVE that the earth is ancient and europe and america were one continent.

I don't have any problem with Pangea as a theory, but it is far from being proven. If we are on the same earth, with the same crust, then why would they look, feel, taste, or be composed of anything other then the natural sediment of igneous and metamorphic rock? Answer: They wouldn't. Unless the claim is that part of the earth comes from another planet and the other part is truley terrestrial, I see no reason to assume otherwise.

AND i did not say mankind originates from 2 people, this is scientifically impossible, humanity would have in-bred itself into oblivion a few generations later.

It's not scientifically impossible. Man, as well as all living organisms are retrogressing. That means at the singularity of time, all life was much more pure on the cellular and molecular level. As time goes by, each time a new being is procreated the genes get weaker. This phenomena is known as 'gene depletion'. But, evolution by necessity has to be going up continually. Clearly this is not the case. We are continually becoming less adept in our world. The sun was the most powerful it ever was upon creation of it. Whether you think the nebular host was created by a big bang or a Creator. That is immaterial. What is important is to know that the sun is much weaker than when it first began. This is the same for all organisms on earth, genetically. We are inferior to our distant forefathers.

ok, how do you explain that white people have the exact gene for black skin, a dna section that codes for the protein melanin, except that it is just "switched off" in white people by another gene which "cancels" the order?

The difference between the races is nominal. And this is a case of microevolution (small adaptations due to isolation), not macroevolution. They only difference between blacks from whites, is more or less melanin in their skin cells. This isn't a big deal. Just like different breeds of dogs doesn't make it any more or less than canine, so also does skin tone make no difference in determining humans.

ok, like you say, you don't think the 7th day is any more sacred than the other days, kinda proves my point. also its not much of a coincidence that judaism christianity and islam think the seventh day is sacred, they are basically the same religion.

In the old days, observation of the commencement of life was honored. It was only until Jesus said that the Sabbath was created for man and not for God, that we understood His heart. I was not suggesting that there is something inherent in us that 'knows' that the 7th day is sacred. What I was saying is that if many cultures that seem otherwise in no way connected, they still observe the 7th as sacred. This means it was passed down. But if man ascended through evolution, we would see no evidence of this at all. Different tribes would do different things and in no way seem to parallel one another. Human language is the same from this.

the fact that jesus was raised from the dead is in the bible and is celebrated by christians as a holy day, proves the falseness of the bible and christianity, no one can be raised from the dead.

It's called a 'miracle' because it isn't an everyday occurance. It defies the fields of physics and the constants that maintains them. That's precisely what makes it so special. That's why it's called a miracle.

jonah is also complete bullshit.

on that link you posted the man fell into the sea, and the whale was eventually harpooned THE SAME DAY, and cut open.

I said it was possible, and clearly it was. Aside from that, we have no idea how big the whale or fish was that swallowed Jonah. I don't believe in the story of Jonah by just hearing about the testimony. I believe in the story of Jonah because the Bible continually proves itself right. Therefore, I have no reason to doubt the validity of the story.



"More damaging to the story was a letter written by the wife of the captain of the 'Star of the East,' Mrs John Killam.

The contents of her letter were published in 1907 in 'The Expository Times' by a reader who had corresponded with Mrs Killam about the whale story.

She said, "There is not one word of truth to the whale story. I was with my husband all the years he was in the Star of the East. There was never a man lost overboard while my husband was with her. The sailor has told a great sea yarn."

hahahah disproved, anyway it is shear lunacy to think that someone could be swallowed by a whale(which feed on krill) survive the crushing pressures at great depths, lack of air, strong stomach acid, and be spat out alive and well after a month!!!!

if you think this is possible, i class you as an idiot.

This disproves nothing. You believe that what was written by his wife, and you base that on no fact. So why choose one over the other? There are several articles printed about James Bartley and his whole crew corroborated the story.



"1 in 10 to the billionth power" yes this number may be true, (i know its not true, no one can really know) but if you give it enough time, and enough collisions betwean organic molecules you might well happen on a system which can reproduce itself.

Nothing has ever been able to produce itself. Since nothing only ends up with nothing, it stands through sheer logic that it's not possible.

if you understood reproduction a bit more in detail, you would begin to understand the true beauty of life.

I do understand reproduction. Perhaps if Charles Darwin had read Gregor Mendels' thesis on this very subject, he might not have come to such terrible conclusions.



[This message has been edited by hyroglyphx (edited 11-14-2005).]

quote:Originally posted by T-BagBikerStar:



I will certainly grant you that, but this does not take in to account the fact that life doesn't come from non-life. Here's the theory of the Big Bang. Nothing exploded and here we are. That is an atheistic version of Creatio ex nihilo (Creation out of nothing), to which they call a religious belief. The difference would be? Abiogenesis is a physical impossibility. Something always comes from something else. We always procreate... Only God can create.



I will only reply to this for now, as I feel my last post responded to the rest of your post fairly well, some clearing up to do still I bet.

Just because science hasn't been able to explain the big bang yet, I would not view it in the same way. There are infact several theories on how the universe first origionated all leading back to the first 10^-20 to 10^-43 seconds after the big bang as identical to the standard big bang model, but then varying in some way to change such an impossibility. I'm currently reading a book on theoretical physics by a professor at Colombia University, explaining several of these possibilities, so although it is not explained for sure, science has laid out several possibilities for these first few moments that avoid things that are impossible such as that.

The big bang is a good theory supposing that there was something there prior to the singularity. But there was not. Einstein knew this well. So surely there is cause and effect. Anything apart from this is a metaphysical mystery. But why think that such a cause exists at all? Very simply, the causal inference is based in the metaphysical intuition that something cannot come out of absolutely nothing. A pure potentiality cannot actualize itself. In the case of the universe (including any boundary points), there was not anything physically prior to the initial singularity. The potentiality for the existence of the universe could not therefore have lain in itself, since it did not exist prior to the singularity. On the theistic hypothesis, the potentiality of the universe's existence lay in the power of God to create it. On the atheistic hypothesis, there did not even exist the potentiality for the existence of the universe. But then it seems inconceivable that the universe should become actual if there did not exist any potentiality for its existence. It seems to me therefore, that a little reflection leads us to the conclusion that the origin of the universe had a cause... You can't just say, nothing blew up and here we are. But once you sift through the detritus and sort through the words of many cosmologists, that is exactly what they are saying. In your defense, it is equally unacceptable to just say that 'God made us and that's the way it is.'... Even if that's true, it is neglectful to make such a claim without some retort. But here's the thing. The Big bang and the creation models will always be theories because no one was around, or will be around to test and observe these occurances.

*Why are there many religions with different Gods? Which God is "God?

- Actually most most religions worship to the same god. They just have different ways of going about it.

*Why does the church make so much damn money? Millions of dollars are donated, what happens to all that money?

- That's all very complicated. I could explain the history of it, but the bottom line is the church has so much money because billions of people love their religions enough to donate retarded ammounts of money. Also, some churches do a lot of corrupt things to get more money. As for what happens to it, it goes to buying the pope a new pope-mobile or the bishop a big fancy hat.

*The bible was written by many people at different times, and even today revisions are being made. Isn't there a chance that something wasn't written in or that something was misunderstood or that it's all a story and nothing more?

- Is this an actual question, or are you being rhetorical, because of course there's a freaking chance of that. Are you just being a smart ass, because you're not being very smart.

*God loves all right? So why send us to hell if we're bad? I thought he loved us all and forgave our sins?

- I don't even believe in god, but okay, I'll try on this one... Your parents make you sit in the corner or send you to your room. In an eternity that's probably how hell feels. And he only forgives all our sins in some religions. Also, not all religions preach a heaven and a hell.

*Really, if there was one God, then everybody should believe in that one specific God, not there own. That shows that nobody not even the church knows the truth, it's all money.

- A lot of it's money. But, not all of it. Some people really believe in their certain religions. It gives them a sense of pride, security, and community that enriches their lives. There's nothing wrong with that.

Cheers,

Lost

Lost Cause I was being a smart ass on that question and I was being serious.

In conclusion, it's a book, it's fact or fiction, whatever makes you sleep at night. I think believing in something that's only written in a book is just as good as believing in the Loch Ness monster. Technically you can believe in aliens and nobody can tell you you're crazy, because believing in an imaginary person who watchs over you is normal, right?

And you cannot tell me its not imaginary, if you say you must have faith, then why don't I just die now and get it over with?

Do you all believe in the Tooth fairy? If not why? Because it's just a story? Because you've never seen it, or because you have no faith in it. The only thing you should have faith in is yourself, not something else.

I believe we aren't even from this planet, why you ask, because nobody knows were we came from, it's all assumptions.

[This message has been edited by 00258 (edited 11-14-2005).]

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



Not even a half an hour ago you were telling me how pefect the dates they get, everytime. I'm showing you that there are some serious discrepencies that unbiased sources, (i.e. not Christiananswers) will clearly state. Look, you can't call something science if it doesn't match up. First, you formulate a hypothesis, then you test the hypothesis, then you have to have reconcilable recurrances, everytime. you have to have a predictable outcome everytime, otherwise that isn't science. The C14 is a very, very good theory in principle and sometimes you get a good average... But this is a tool, not the be-all end-all. And I pointing out this as just one reference of isochron being problematic.

Well when 99% of the time they can find a neaderthal bone and date it to between certain dates when neanderthals existed, or to fit the C-14 theme 99% of the time they find aborigionese bones in australia they date it between 0 and 47000 years ago, and the other times they can find hints of contamination in their sample, I think it's a pretty solid theory, remember you origionally sited this as a reason you thought common belief was weak, and if they are finding 99% of samples to give them dates that are right on, in thousands of cases, then the odds of this not working become unbelievably small. Yeah, it's not perfect at giving perfect dates, but you were using it to say the odds of common science being right are incredibly small, but this only shows a reason for the odds of it being right to be incredibly large, and no matter how you manipulate it, even if C-14 was not accurate at all you could only get this point to show at best 50-50 between science and creationism, and I believe it has been shown to be far more accurate than 50-50, leaving the creationism odds so unrealistically small that the only way you can even logically continue belief in your way is to say that "god set the planet up in said way to test our faith".

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



No, that isn't always the case. The animal has to ingest the radiometric substance, somehow to get it into it's body. So if you are using the Potassium-argon method (potassium decays into argon), then the creature has to have it in the body for starters. But yes, I agree that other radiometric dating is more reliable. This was never the issue. The issue is with C14 which you continually seem to want to argue over. I think I've more than presented a good argument against it.



again 99.9...% chance it works from what has been shown, "god must have made it that way if there is any change the world is as described in the holy book."

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



Why do you keep mentioning Christianity when we are talking about science. The quarrel it seems with many evolutionists is that the Bible is going to be taught alongside Creationism. this isn't the case. Most Creationists believe that the Bible is corroborated with true science, but trust me, there are many types of Creationists. Some, who don't believe in the Bible at all. I'm just telling you that there is a mind behind all that is. We could argue the semantics of theology, but it isn't it's place. I think you and other evolutioists think that Creation science consists of sitting around reading Genesis. It isn't. The Bible is not a science textbook, nor should it be employed as such, or thought of, as such. Creationism should be based on science alone. But if it ends up supporting the Bible, then great... All the better.



Yeah, well we see creationism as dead wrong, or about as likely to be right as the 1/10^billion figure you stated earlier, although I'd have to put the odds of my being insane or incapable of forming a logical thought at higher than that so I'd say the odds creationism is right are a bit higher, but viewing all factors I am given with my mind it seems like complete nonsense to believe, and we all know that the large majority of creationists are Christians, and creationism has it's origions in the bible/torah.

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



Yes, but we find bones all over the world. My issue was that they were using C14 dating to determine that. But as I pointed out, C14 is probably the most unreliable of all the other radiometric dating. Besides this, they seem to change their tune alot. One year, the oldest is in France. Another, the oldest is in Africa. The next, the oldest is in Canada. All the while professing tiself to be empirical science. This is why I take much of what they have to say with a grain of salt.



I don't ever remember a time when it wasn't in Africa, but the location doesn't even matter, how can you explain that nearly all the galaxies we can see are moving away from us, and that this rate is accelerating?? Well by looking at the odds you can't assume a that this is just by chance (over 1 billion galaxies over 99% of which are moving away from us), the universe must be expanding at a rate that is accelerating. This is contrary to what the bible implies in the first place, but we'll go on anyways, and there is no way any forces could simply cause the universe to gain such speed over such a short period of time, you have to simply say, "god made it this way".

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



Sunday is not the seventh day. Sunday is the first day. Saturday is the Sabbath. The Catholic church changed it many centuries ago.



I don't care.

quote:Originally posted by hyroglyphx:



No one has ever been able to duplicate life. But being that even single-celled organisms are highly complex, it stands to reason that chance doesn't fit into it. It takes 20 amino acids (all of which are extremely complex) just to form one protein. It takes 5 specific kinds of protein (all of which are extremely complex) just to make one single molecule. And being that no one, even under pristine laboratory conditions can do it, tells me that 'nothing' surely can't do it.



They have run tests where they put the compounds believed to be on early earth, water, oxygen, small amounts of other compounds, all flowing through some tubes with a spark being passed through at some point because conditions were very harsh and there was lots of lightning on early earth. In the end there were not only amino acids, but proteins that had formed in the test tubes. so this is on a tiny part of a our single planet that this could occur, now multiply the still tiny chance that life would start over the whole span of the area of our planet, now divide by the few days/weeks spent on that experiment and multiply by the 14 billion years since the big bang, now multiply by the chance that a solar system has a habitable planet, I'd say about 1/100-1/10 I dunno, then multiply by 1 billion galaxies, and 1 billion solar systems. I'd think there would not only be life on our planet, but it would be started on countless others. The chance is not 1/10^billion that life would get started, it is quite good.