Creation vs. Evolution

[lamont]

This is the main point I got of your post. The theories, fact, or whatever you presented are logical based on our present knowledge of our surroundings (what we see as our universe) and should be pursued further. But you're right, we have no idea what's beyond what we see with the most powerful telescopes. It can be compared to the horizon when looking across the Pacific from California. Given that, it makes any theory we have as to it's creation about as plausible as was the idea that the earth was flat 400 years ago.
But, it's a start and I hope we continue to delve into space. I think that's where the truth will come from.....in a million years or so....

Its also entirely possible we may hit the end of what is knowable at some point. There's no universal guarantee that we can figure it all out. That'd at least keep all the philosophers in business...

IMO, though, if we can't know it, it doesn't really matter -- and I went through my whole "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" phase in college (more accurately a huge internal self-dialog over nihilism and existentialism, the meaning of the universe, yadda, yadda, yadda) and I've basically come to the conclusion that I'd rather go diving...

Which is basically my point about God and Creationism and all that. Either God has crafted everything so carefully that we can't tell the difference, or else God is just some nebulous "First Cause" -- either way it entirely irrelevant to me and I'm going diving...

Life has meaning to me because I go diving, other people in my office think I'm completely nuts... Other people have meaning because they go to church, I think they're completely nuts...

 

[wardric]

(Brief hijack - sorry) I think the Mayan people I've met in Mexico and Belize (as well as those living in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador) would be a little surprised to learn they are "extinct." True, the peak of the classical Mayan civilization was over before conquest, but there are still millions of Maya living in Central America. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_peoples)

That is why I wrote the Maya civilization and not the mayans.
From your link: This article is about the people of the former Maya civilization after the conquest by Spain. See Maya civilization for the pre-Columbian culture.

I did meet a lot of them in Mexico too myself. Most friendly people. But the civilization that built the pyramids was entirely lost long ago.

What am i still doing here :sigh:

 

[MikeFerrara]

i'll let Jesus spak for himself. why would Jesus change gears and go from talking about the second coming in one sentence to talking about the transfiguration in the next? don't make sense textually.

he says he will come back with the angels and the glory of his Father, and he will give each their due reward (the second coming -- hasn't happened yet).

he then says, some of you will not die before that happens (they are all dead by now).

you can draw your own conclusions:

Matthew 16:27-28

For the Son of Man is to come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then he will give everyone his due reward.

Truly I tell you: there are some of those standing here who will not taste death before they have seen the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom.

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

Read Matthew 16 and 17 and Luke 9 and Mark 8. It seems pretty clear. The entire account of the transfiguration is in Mark 9 and begins with Mark 9:1 And he said to them, "Assuredly I say to you that there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the Kingdom of God present with Power"

Mark 8 of course is still where he explain the he must suffer.

Luke 9 contains both with no cahpter break with Luke 9:27"But I tell you the truely, there are some standing here who shall not tast death till they have seen the Kingdom of God."

Again, read all three and I think that it's more than clear. that's why it's so dangerous to take bits and pieces out of context and the meaning that you are assigning is completely out of context. If, Matthew 16 didn't contain that one apparent reference to the end of times Mathew 17:27, there wouldn't be anything to jump on at all. Why anyone would tie those two verses so closely together and ignore the rest of the context is beyond me, especially in light of the accounts in Luke and Mark.

So by all means. let Jesus speak for himself. If you were going to question what Jesus said about the end times and when they would come, Matthew 24, Mark 13 or Luke 21 would be a better place to start because He really was talking about the end times in those chapters but as I said, that's another discussion. One that I am more than willing to have.

Before we get into it though, you should not only carefully read the gospels but you should also read Isaiah. And no, it's not at all unrelated.

by the way, no less an authority than C.S. Lewis has called this verse
the most embarrasing Bible passage for Christianity.

somebody got something wrong somewhere

Other than the fact that he was a popular author, I don't know much about CS Lewis. Was he an authority? I can't imagine any one who has really read Matthew, Mark and Luke having much trouble with this. I certainly can't imagin any one spending enough time in the Bible to become an expert if they think that there is anything there to be embarassed about. I'll try to look up what he had to say though.

One of the most popular christian authors today is a guy by the name of Rick Warren. His books are sweeping churches by storm. His garbage is everywhere. He does an incredible job of taking scripture out of context to make it mean what he wants it to mean to the point that I can't believe that any Bible teaching church would let his books in the door. Still, I'm sure there are many who consider him an expert of some kind. I think most people are too lazy to read it themselves and see.

Then of course there's plenty of other experts with books in the book stores like Dr. Camping who wrote books like "Time has an End" and Beyond the Church Age (I think it's called. He's an expert who swears that the Bible tells us that Christs return will be in 2011 and the church age is over so it's no longer possible to be saved in church because Satan is in control of all the local cingregations. There are a lot of churches that I wouldn't go anywhere near but this guy is over the top. This guy takes all the numbers he finds in the bible and adds this to that, subtracts the other and takes Biblical meaning from the individual numbers he gets when he factors everything out...it's a blast to read but he is definately considered by some to be an expert.

I've only been at this for a fairly short time and I could already go on and on about experts.

by the way, fist you said "that's not what Jesus said," and when I show you that
is in fact what he said, you have to explain it away by using unrelated texts ...

You hadn't identified a scripture yet at that time but rather just made a statement about what you thought it said. I was saying that your statment was incorrect and I stand by that. So...I asked you to specify a chapter and verse and you picked the easy one. The texts I used to explain it are not unrelated...they are the context in which the two verses that you are questioning are contained.

You can only get away with a line of questioning like that in court Andy...Just answer yes or no!...and don't tell me that the question doesn't make sense....just answer yes or no! LOL

 

[ffestpirate]

What am i still doing here :sigh:

good question

 

[H2Andy]

when i read about string theory and n dimnesions, i keep thinking about all the models of the solar system with the earth at its center, and how complicated they got, with wheels turning on wheels, and some going back and some going forward for the whole thing to "work" (i.e. match up with observable results)

i wonder if the same is not true here. the science boys are doing the best they can to make the current model work, but that's just not the right model.

when they get the right model (if they get the right model), it will all make much more sense, and it will be much more simple

 

[wardric]

good question

you scurvy dawwwg, gimme some rum

 

[H2Andy]

You can only get away with a line of questioning like that in court Andy...Just answer yes or no!...and don't tell me that the question doesn't make sense....just answer yes or no! LOL

ah, what's the question? i must have missed it (nice dig at my real life profession, btw... you know, Jesus hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors, which are just slightly more acceptable than lawyers )

alas, it seems that we differ in our interpretation of the passage. i am going from the textual context and what the writer wrote, not the reams of papers written by theologians centuries later.

one more interesting quote from the Bible:

Mark 10:21

Jesus looking at him loved him, and said to him, "One thing you lack. Go, sell whatever you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me, taking up the cross."

i dont' know any Christians alive today that have sold all they have and given it to the poor, do you?

 

[lamont]

when i read about string theory and n dimnesions, i keep thinking about all the models of the solar system with the earth at its center, and how complicated they got, with wheels turning on wheels, and some going back and some going forward for the whole thing to "work" (i.e. match up with observable results)

i wonder if the same is not true here. the science boys are doing the best they can to make the current model work, but that's just not the right model.

when they get the right model (if they get the right model), it will all make much more sense, and it will be much more simple

yup, for a long time physics got stuck on the concept of the ether until einstein blew it away. i'd lay a small wager on the bet that the string theory guys are applying what has worked for the past 100 years into regimes where it no longer applies... fundamentally the concepts of string theory are just wrapping up GUT-like symmetries into a calabi-yau space similarly to the embedding of U(1) into general relativity in kaluza-klein theory.

check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaluza-Klein_theory:

" In 1926, Oskar Klein proposed that the fourth spatial dimension is curled up in a circle of very small radius, so that a particle moving a short distance along that axis would return to where it began. The distance a particle can travel before reaching its initial position is said to be the size of the dimension. This extra dimension is a compact set, and the phenomenon of having a space-time with compact dimensions is referred to as compactification."

so they've been trying to make it work since 1926 and they still have no empirical evidence to support compact dimensions..

 

[H2Andy]

ah, you just like went past the borders of my knowledge and kept on going

 

[dlndavid]

ah, you just like went past the borders of my knowledge and kept on going

go stand in the corner Andy