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Skeptic's hammer

Skeptic's hammer

Spirituality

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This is an opportunity for people who believe in the Bible to show that skeptics are incorrect. The reference will be the annotated skeptic's bible (www.skepticsannotatedbible.com). I suggest we start at the very beginning...

Gen.1:1 - 2:3
The creation account in Genesis 1 conflicts with the order of events that are known to science. In Genesis, the earth is created before light and stars, birds and whales before reptiles and insects, and flowering plants before any animals. The true order of events was just the opposite.

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Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
This is an opportunity for people who believe in the Bible to show that skeptics are incorrect. The reference will be the annotated skeptic's bible (www.skepticsannotatedbible.com). I suggest we start at the very beginning...

Gen.1:1 - 2:3
The creation account in Genesis 1 conflicts with the order of events that are known to science. In Genesis, ...[text shortened]... nsects, and flowering plants before any animals. The true order of events was just the opposite.
There is a lot of assumption in that "true order of events". "Origins" is a huge subject.

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Originally posted by Halitose
There is a lot of assumption in that "true order of events". "Origins" is a huge subject.
I hope that the scientists among us will step up to the plate for that one.

Meanwhile, here's a more literary issue:

The two contradictory creation accounts.

First Account (Genesis 1:1-2:3) (Humans were created before the other animals)

Second Account (Genesis 2:4-25)
Gen.1:25-27
(Humans were created after the other animals.)

Gen.2:18-19
(Humans were created before the other animals.)

Gen.1:27
(The first man and woman were created simultaneously.)

Gen.2:18-22
(The man was created first, then the animals, then the woman from the man's rib.)

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Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
This is an opportunity for people who believe in the Bible to show that skeptics are incorrect. The reference will be the annotated skeptic's bible (www.skepticsannotatedbible.com). I suggest we start at the very beginning...

Gen.1:1 - 2:3
The creation account in Genesis 1 conflicts with the order of events that are known to science. In Genesis, ...[text shortened]... nsects, and flowering plants before any animals. The true order of events was just the opposite.
Is it worth deconstructing the literal meaning of the bible?

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(1:3-5, 14-19) "Let there be light"
God creates light and separates light from darkness, and day from night, on the first day. Yet he didn't make the light producing objects (the sun and the stars) until the fourth day (1:14-19). And how could there be "the evening and the morning" on the first day if there was no sun to mark them?

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(1:6-8) The Firmament (Heaven)
God spends one-sixth of his entire creative effort (the second day) working on a solid firmament. This strange structure, which God calls heaven, is intended to separate the higher waters from the lower waters.

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(1:11-13)
"Let the earth bring forth grass"
Plants are made on the third day before there was a sun to drive their photosynthetic processes (1:14-19). Notice, though, that God lets "the earth bring forth" the plants, rather than creating them directly. Maybe Genesis is not so anti-evolution after all.


Edit: That's enough for now.

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Originally posted by Palynka
Is it worth deconstructing the literal meaning of the bible?
I guess that depends on you. I'm merely hoping for some energetic debate from all sides here.

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Originally posted by Palynka
Is it worth deconstructing the literal meaning of the bible?
When people follow that literal meaning as a process of life and an opinion on how others should lead their lives, yes, it is absolutely worthy.

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Originally posted by Palynka
Is it worth deconstructing the literal meaning of the bible?
It might be, even if just one bible literalist is saved.

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Originally posted by David C
It might be, even if just one bible literalist is saved.
I guess you'll need a bigger hammer then. 🙂

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Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
(1:3-5, 14-19) "Let there be light"
God creates light and separates light from darkness, and day from night, on the first day. Yet he didn't make the light producing objects (the sun and the stars) until the fourth day (1:14-19). And how could there be "the evening and the morning" on the first day if there was no sun to mark them?
For the sake of argument:

Aren't you assuming that the sun was the only source of light during the creation process. The last clause of the verse is a resumption of the whole process of time during this first work of creation.
The day is described, according to the Hebrew mode of narrative, by its starting-point, “the evening.” The first half of its course is run out during the night. The next half in like manner commences with “the morning,” and goes through its round in the proper day. Then the whole period is described as “one day.” The point of termination for the day is thus the evening again, which agrees with the Hebrew division of time.

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Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
(1:6-8) The Firmament (Heaven)
God spends one-sixth of his entire creative effort (the second day) working on a solid firmament. This strange structure, which God calls heaven, is intended to separate the higher waters from the lower waters.
Erm... Lower water = ocean. Higher water = Water vapour in the form of clouds.

Some creationists use this as a basis for the "vapour canopy" theory which supposedly collapsed during the flood.

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Originally posted by Halitose
For the sake of argument:

Aren't you assuming that the sun was the only source of light during the creation process.
What other natural light-producing objects do we know of other than the sun and stars? How else to produce the effect of night & day?

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nm