 Among Christians there should be no questions or debates about the origins of life, the earth or the universe. |
||||
|
– How important is this for Christians to deal with? Dr. Danny Faulkner, Author, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, retired and now on staff with Answers in Genesis and its Creation Museum responded:
True, but Dr. Faulkner misses the elephant in the room. Dr. Hugh Ross, Astronomer and best-selling author responded:
Dr. Ross’ answer not only misses the elephant in the room, but it is also very misleading. Why do the biblical creeds not mention the time of creation? (More importantly the duration.) Because that is not one of the issues they were dealing with at the time. In the first few centuries after Christ’s resurrection, the church was besieged with Christological issues – docetism (Christ only seemed to have a body but was really just spiritual), gnosticism (a whole range of errors regarding God from which we get the phrase “children of a lesser god”; errors regarding Christ; and the nature of good and evil), monophysitism (Christ had only one nature), and so on. So they were concerned with clearly and correctly defining who Christ was – that he was “very God from very God” (from the Nicene Creed) and “one person with two natures” (From the Definition of Chalcedon). The Nicene Creed was written in 325 AD; the definition of Chalcedon was written in 451. The issue of the length of creation didn’t come up until needed for evolution, and Darwin didn’t publish “Origin of Species” until 1859. So of course the creeds don’t deal with that. Dr. Ross also states big bang cosmology identifies the who of creation as the God of the Bible. Really? Perhaps he should tell that to Continue Reading |
Author Archives: Duane Caldwell
A Resurrection Day Response
I was asked by multiple atheists – what if some other religious book were true? Here is the response.
In the song “Nada One” Heart’s Nancy Wilson sings about an ephemeral, nocturnal love who has glowing, night creature eyes that frequents her dreams. This mysterious love seems to appear only in dreams where no one can see him. For even when wandering through streets, she describes this scene:
With such descriptions, one questions the reality of his existence. Indeed she herself seems to harbor a doubt or two since she must reminder herself “you are as real as I feel.” The one thing that’s not mysterious in this song, is what she means by “nada one.” Clearly “nada one” is a play on the sound of the phrase “not a one,” yet still, one must wonder – since it is always capitalized – if she’s using it as a proper noun – speaking or referring to a being named “Nada One.” The Wilson sisters were purposefully ambiguous for artistic purposes. But as we’ll see God is purposefully clear and unambiguous to eliminate doubt and nurture faith. I was reminded of this song as I awaited responses to a question I had posed. Let me step back and explain. I saw the below tweet that informed people that last Thursday was “National Ask an Atheist Day.”
This seemed like a perfect opportunity to re-query the unbelieving regarding a question I had asked in a Continue Reading |
Atheists – too afraid to answer
 Some Atheists are too afraid to answer the difficult questions. |
||||
|
There’s a very good article by Peter Saunders titled Twenty questions Atheists struggle to Answer: How Theism does better on the first six. Before presenting the first six issues which atheists struggle to answer (actually he’s being kind – he uses “struggle” as if they have an answer when actually atheism has no reasonable answer to the first 6.), he makes some preliminary comments. The third comment he makes – actually a challenge – is particularly apropos to a recent discussion I had. Speaking to Atheists and agnostics, Saunders says:
Of particular interest is the second sentence, a description of the toxic environment often created by atheists in their so called “discussions” with Christians or theists – discussions which are for the atheist often little more than opportunities to mock. To the list of the usual allegations I would add the allegation of “fallacious argument” a claim atheists wield as a shield against anyone who doesn’t agree with them – apparently before even reading the argument because they use it even when it doesn’t apply. Case in point, my last article – an article which ended with a hypothetical question along the lines of Pascal’s wager: Continue Reading |
A question of authority
What will it take for you to believe? Charlton Heston as Moses – “You are not worthy to receive these commandments” |
||||
|
Twitter is of course home to many ongoing debates, one of which is the ongoing debate between atheists and theists; creationists and materialists – those who adhere to the standard non-supernatural theories of origins for the universe and life. One such debate was brought to my attention with the following tweet:
To the contrary:
This directly contradicts the contention that all fossils are “arranged in evolutionary order”. In fact the situation is worse than that when one considers Continue Reading |
Science by Fiat & failed Judo throws – Cosmos’ failed attempts to defend evolution
 In a failed attempted to defend evolutionary theory, Cosmos Episode 2 resorts to science without evidence, and evidently expects to be believed “because I said so.”
…is there a question evidence anywhere in our future? |
||||
|
In the classic 1980’s Wendy’s ad, Clara Peller, after looking at a hamburger that’s mostly bun and almost no meat famously asks, “Where’s the beef?” After watching the second episode of the reboot of Cosmos – titled Cosmos A Space Time Odyssey episode 2 – Some Of The Things Molecules Do I was reminded of that ad as I wondered “Where’s the science?” This episode of Cosmos wants to convince you that evolution is true, and it’s Yes, Cosmos took a page straight out of a judo manual: Continue Reading |
Reclaiming the Intellectual and Moral high ground
Don’t fall prey to logical traps, old arguments, or the emotional baiting of evolutionists.
 “It’s over Anakin, I have the high ground.” |
||||
| In my previous post I referenced an article titled “The Top 10 Signs that You Don’t Understand Evolution at All” which is really a restatement of objections that evolutionists believe they have adequately answered, while at the same time lightly(?) mocking creationists – as evolutionists are wont to do. (Whether lightly or not I’ll leave to you.) As is typical in a list like this, the more important questions (for which they have no answer) are not even mentioned much less given adequate answers to. But since I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving you hanging without the answers having myself referenced the article, here are responses to show none of these issues are problems for rational thinking Christians. A word of warning before we begin: Since he couches many of these statements in broad universals (“never,” “always,” etc. – which is a dead give away that the statement is almost certainly untrue and a good candidate for the “all or nothing” logical fallacy); it follows that the position he’s trying to ridicule may be technically untrue, but the point beneath the ridicule that he’s trying to make has been thoroughly refuted as I note below. Below in bold is Tyler Francke’s list of “The top 10 signs that you don’t understand evolution at all” with my explanations following immediately; and so there is no mistake on who’s saying what, my comments are indicated by my initials.
DC>He makes a number of questionable statements here, I’ll just point out a couple. First he notes:
DC>Evolution of the type we’re talking about – molecules to man is not observable. Like many evolutionists he is committing the logical error of equivocation – using the term evolution in more than one sense (which is commonly done to win arguments, though it’s logically fallacious). Natural selection (which is not evolution) is observable; molecules to man evolution is not. Second, he goes on to talk about an inference to the best explanation (which I drew upon in my last article) but intelligent design theorists and creationists alike, (not to mention scientists who dissent from evolutionary theory) would say given the evidence, such as the fossil evidence below, he has not drawn an inference to the best explanation by believing it points to evolution. He states:
DC>I would challenge him that it is not the evidence that points him to evolution, it’s his a priori beliefs (science is authoritative over scripture) that lead him to the conclusion that evolution is true because judging by evidence alone, (such as the evidence from DNA, the young solar system, etc.) the correct conclusion is that there was an intelligent designer. 2. You think we’ve never found a transitional fossil. DC>This is frankly very misleading. A more precise statement would be Continue Reading |
The Poor Marksmanship of Evolutionists
Evolutionists claim to be answering a problem posed to them, but they often avoid the problem or miss the mark.
 Kahn: Kirk – You’re still alive old friend.
Kirk: Still, – “old friend”. You’ve managed to kill everyone else, but like a poor marksman, you keep missing the target! And so admiral1 Kirk taunts Kahn, a genetically engineered “super” human who is supposed to be superior to us mere humans in every way – physically, mentally etc. In another classic line, when Kirk is trying to get Kahn to follow the Enterprise into a nebulae where both ships would lose the benefits of key systems such as shields, Kirk taunts Kahn again, saying “I’m laughing at the superior intellect,” a taunt sufficient enough to get Kahn to follow them in. I don’t mean to taunt the poor misguided evolutionists, but I do hope the air of superiority they tend to express motivates them to try to provide an answer to the questions posed in the post “Windtalkers and DNA” because the responses I’ve had so far don’t address the issues. So like Kirk I say, like poor marksmen, they keep missing the target of the difficulties that DNA poses. So let me spell it out the difficulties for them, – and give them a clear target to hit. But first here is a sample of the poor marksmanship: Continue Reading |
Authors and Sources
Following is a listing of authors and sources cited and the Rational Faith article they were cited in. Continue Reading
The Best Reason for Apologetics
As you might imagine of one hosting a website that deals with apologetic issues, I listened with interest to the debate last Saturday on Moody’s Up For Debate entitled “Do Apologetics Help or Hurt our Christian Witness?” As always the host, Julie Roys welcomed well qualified guests for the discussion: author and professor David Fitch and author and professor Nancy Pearcey. Dr. Fitch offered the concern that apologetics train us in a posture of defensiveness; and that we don’t listen as well, having answers ready before we hear the question. His main objection is summarized in this tweet:
We have a posture of defensiveness which is not needed. Rather we need to embody the story God is telling through us. – #DavidFitch
— Up for Debate Radio (@Up4DebateRadio) March 8, 2014
Professor Pearcey had a number of good responses, in addition to her own testimony of how apologetics helped her come to the faith, some of her reminders include:
– We need to be inclusive in our approaches
– We should use all the tools available to us
– It is possible to do apologetics wrong (implied: therefore learn to do it right!)
– Apologetics can descend into a game of “gotcha”
– And as she reminded us in this tweet:
#Apologetics assists in making ones understanding not simply emotional but intellectually. – #NancyPearcey
— Up for Debate Radio (@Up4DebateRadio) March 8, 2014
But the answer I was expecting, Continue Reading
What is Rational Faith? Part 2
The 19th century classic “Flatland” by Edwin A. Abbott is an allegory of the resulting social problems and intellectual impasse that results when a person who has been enlightened (and sees a truth beyond what’s normally possible in the physical realm) tries to present that truth to the unenlightened. Flatland is so named because it, and all its inhabitants live in a two dimensional world. When a 3 dimensional object – a being in the shape of a sphere – is introduced to a 2 dimensional Flatlander – a mathematician – the response of humans to revelations (by way of analogy) is on display.
As you might expect, the mathematician has the all the concepts and mathematical knowledge to understand the description of a sphere, but while he understands technically what the sphere is saying, since a 3 dimensional object is outside of the realm of the possible within a 2 dimension world, he has a hard time believing what the sphere is saying is true – until the sphere performs miracles – that is to say feats that are miraculous to the two dimensional characters of the story, yet totally understandable to a 3 dimensional person (such as the reader). The main conflict of story centers around the beliefs of most flatlanders: since – as far as they are concerned – 3 dimensional objects are impossible and don’t exist, anyone who claims they are possible (or has seen one) is either insane or dangerous or both, and thus must be placed permanently in a mental institution or must be put to death. Without delving any further into the story, let me point out what Abbott so masterfully illustrates using concepts that we, as 3 dimensional beings, readily understand by his analogy: Continue Reading
