paper against evolution, for intelligent design

I am sorry about not replying sooner, I just found this website.Rei, I wanted to show you your mistakes about saying that God tempts. He absolutley DOES NOT. I just wanted to point out a couple of scriptures that may have you change your mind.James 1:13-15 clearly states that:"When tempted, no one should say, 'God is tempting me.' For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death." http://www.biblegateway.com/...
{Shortened URL display form, to restore page with to normal - Adminnemooseus}Also, if you look more closely at Numbers 22, you will see that your statement had a condition you forgot to mention. You said:God told Balaam to go somewhere, and when Balaam went there, God got mad at him for going there and put an angel in his path.As you can see from Numbers 22:20-22, God tell Balaam to go somewhere IF MEN COME TO GET HIM. THEN HE ARISES (ON HIS OWN), and that is when God gets angry, because BALAAM DISOBEYED GOD'S COMMAND.Numbers 22: 20-22 says:God came to Balaam at night and said to him, "If the men have come to call you, rise up and go with them; but only the word which I speak to you shall you do." So Balaam arose in the morning, and saddled his donkey and went with the leaders of Moab. But God was angry because he was going, and the angel of the LORD took his stand in the way as an adversary against him. http://www.biblegateway.com/...
{Shortened URL display form, to restore page with to normal - Adminnemooseus}So God never tempts anyone. I will assume that you had truthfully never read this part before, but if you were trying to trick anyone into not believing the bible, then refer back to the forum rules, and look at #7.http:///WebPages/ForumRules.html[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 12-13-2003]

Okay Mr. Moderator, I will try to stay closer on subject. I think it was a relavant point since I see the evolution/creation debate and the Bible as inseperable. You attack the Bible, and you attack the premises of Creationism. But with that said, I will move on.I just wanted to point out that I won't be able to talk much on here until after Christmas, so please forgive me for being slow.And to my point. FliesOnly, I have known Matt for a while, and I know what is taught at his school. I don't mean to commit the same problem by speaking for him, but since I agree with what his school teaches, I will attempt to defend it (as opposed to speaking for Matt, I will speak on behalf of the school).First about your rehetorical question; it is slightly off topic, but again, I believe that Creationism and the Bible are connected. The Bible teaches that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23) So this means no matter how good you are in other people's eyes, you are not perfect, and so you deserve death (as Romans 6:23 says). So everyone deserves to go to Hell. But God in his grace says that if you believe that Jesus is Lord, you will be saved. So that is where Matt is coming from. Like I said, this is slightly off topic for evolution, but it relates to what you were saying to matt.The school does have people who have been accepted into colleges such as Penn, Purdue, and Taylor, and it is accredited. The school does consider biology to be science; that is what Matt is studying now. The school looks at both sides of the evidence, and pretty much allows you to pick your own views, though Matt is a creationist.And an interesting way I have come to accept in view of what you call miracles is that God has instituted what we call laws of science. We need to remember when we say this that science is really actually limited, and cannot use logic deductively, meaning that it is not able to prove anything. So these laws are not truely set then? Does gravity apply in space? Black holes? The laws we all refer to, if instituted by God, then why shouldn't God be able to go outside of that order he has put in the universe? This action of breaking away from the "set laws" of the universe, is what people might call miracles.So when God might not explain the laws in the Bible, there is another way of viewing it. But also, I think it would be unfair to demand that of the Bible, just as much so as saying the Bible is incomplete because it does not mention cars, jetts, or even things like cigars. It is somewhat irrelevant; still though, a good point.Finally, to tie this all back to the main topic so that I don't get accused to following rabbit trails again, this type of stuff will be in the paper the ashley and matt are doing, and we need to consider such ideas as the allowance of the Bible in schools, because it is being used in schools, as Matt has seemed to prove.

By the way, let me know if that is too off topic. It was not my intention to do so, but give me warning anyway.Thanks.

Rei, thanks for your encouragement.Okay, I will let you in on the college thing. This is the first year the school has a senior class, and it has 5 guys. At this point, it already has 3 colleges wanting students, and I know more will come in March. So I guess I wouldn't be able to answer the acceptance rate question now, but I do know of one senior who has about a 1500 on SATs, and class average was something like 1366 (i think).That is a good point for the fact that we as humans notice trends. I will have to visit the section of the fossil record, because as far as i know, multiple layers can form in minutes, and there have been layers that scientists have hailed as thousands of years of history, with trees running up the middle of it all! Not to get off topic though...I thought I was looking at the situation reasonably when I talked about God. And I am not sure you really did the Hebrews or the Old Testament justice. Anyhow, I don't believe (and yet some of my friends will argue this point with me) that I am not able to prove the Bible is true to anyone, for it is God's job to convict people of the truth. I clearly see why people wouldn't take the Bible at face value, but what I was attempting to do was give you something to think about, and maybe have you (or anyone else) give a little more thought to the credibility of the Bible, even just as a historical text.I agree that the view of the world was wrong in Gallileo's day. Now that we know so much more about the way the universe works, wouldn't it be reasonable to forgive those past faults, and work with the knowledge we know now?Finally, your idea of God purposefully deceiving people, and acting as some sort of jokester argument (imho) is stretching things. If you view God as a weak, contradictory being, then yes, I would also conclude that he must be deceiving us, and your logic holds up. This is not so the way I view God. Maybe this part should go on in the faith and belief section. I will try to post in there when I get time to. It may be close to Christmas by the time that happens. I just would like to let you know I want to further debate that point.Thanks for your reply.

Lol! Okay, thanks for all of those threads. That will help a ton.It seems to me that you are saying either that religion and science are completely separate realms, which if true, I would love to talk about the possibility of them not being so, or you are pointing to the fact that creationists have biases toward scripture. If this second option is true, let me remind you that everyone has biases that they bring to the table, and from what I have read, it seems to me that people on both sides of the table don't want to admit this! But why? If everyone has biases, and everyone does, then we should look beyond those at the evidence and logic supporting those biases.I haven't looked yet, but in the site you linked me to, does that explain the isotopes arguement? I don't think I have ever heard of it, but I am more than happy to give my thoughts on the matter once I learn about it. I am not afraid of any evidence that others can't contradict. I am willing to take a shot at it, for I am convinced of my side. Yet if this arguement is indeed unstoppable, I guess I will be forced to rethink my position. I don't believe that God can deceive, so I will do my best to explain why in that thread.

Lol, okay. I don't really have a problem with people saying the earth is really old, because the Bible doesn't give a very clear description of how old it may be. I personally lean toward the idea that the earth is much younger (the moon, for example, seems to be a proof for this "fact"). Maybe I will have to change my position. I don't have time currently to look into it, but I will do so when I have the chance. And Rei, thanks again for the threads.By the way, I would sooner accept an old earth explaination than say God is a prankster, though I do believe he has humor, and that quality was given to us humans as well.

Well I am glad you mentioned that point spencer. I had to argue once that the earth was round against a teacher, and he basically *proved from scripture* that the earth was flat! Well while he went on to show us how this was not the case, I learned an extremely important lesson: WHAT A WORK IMPLIES IS DIFFERENT THAN WHAT IT TEACHES. Yes, the bible does imply that the world was flat - that was something that the writers thought back when the books were written. So in scripture, there is an implication that the sun orbits the earth, but this is because the writers did not have as full a concept of the heavens as we do today. Surely people in several millenniums from now would say the same about us.The number 10,000 years is an approximation due to the geneology in the book of genesis, chapter 4. You can look into that yourself, or I can explain it fuller later if you wish. A good way to find the passage is by going to BibleGateway.com: A searchable online Bible in over 150 versions and 50 languages. and typing in Genesis 4. You may want to read the first 12 chapters or so, depending on how much time you have. Genesis means beginnings, and it is the account of creation, the fall, the flood, and much more. It would make an interesting read to you or others I am sure. Anyhow, I hope this helped.

Hah. If you want to think of the Bible that way, then go ahead. It's wrong, but no one is stopping you. Sure God could have done it that way, but that would have meant he would have revealed scientific knowledge to the writer that was non-existant at the time. You need to remember that just because time or cultural distinctions are different, or in your opinion wrong, does not mean that the message is invalid, much less in any way flawwed by the implications that were taken as fact at the time.More later, I have to go to bed now.

Certainly God has passed his Revelation through men. This is what we call Scripture, or the Bible. After your statement, you presented me with an question:why would God give us such scientific knowledge to create a theory of evolution? Or is he just being a trickster?I am not exactly sure how these are your only two options, and I don't really see how the second question is connected to the first. Forgive me if it seems that I am just ignorant, but would you please explain this?Why would God reveal his word to us? Why would God create us? Why would God send his Son to die for us? Why would God allow us to think rationally and form ideas that are against Him? These are all good questions, some of them mysteries. I would argue that since God has given man something called "free will", which allows us to think for ourselves. Which would you rather have, if you created a host of subordinates? Would you want robots who just do everything right, and echo back things that you have put in their minds? Or would you rather have these beings, who can think, and even if they go against you, they have the choice. I personally would rather have those beings with "free will", because if they were to choose to follow me, I would get more glory from it. Now stepping back from that example, which do you think God would rather have: creature that can think, even if it is against his existence or omnipotence, or creatures that unthinkingly follow what you have "programmed" them to think? I think God would rather the first one, and he gets more glory from it because he is not glorifying himself, but others are glorifying Him (even if they are subordinates).(And FliesOnly, thanks for the greeting - I will look at your points asap; I currently have a bunch I need to do.)