How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

[jgk3]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

So Mos, how does this sound: "Worship whatever you like, as long as its spoken in Armenian and funds Etchmiadzin."?

[ArmSurvival]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Sorry to burst your bubble I know about evolution, so what kind of monkey did you come from

Your question already indicates that you don't understand the fundamental concept behind evolution.

And even if you don't agree with evolution, you have to admit it has a hell of a lot more evidence than pretending someone's ghost is conversing with you.

[TomServo]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

And even if you don't agree with evolution, you have to admit it has a hell of a lot more evidence than pretending someone's ghost is conversing with you.

"Molly... you in danger, gurl."

[MrHyeSev]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Ok Arm, enlighten me...what do you believe ?

Your question already indicates that you don't understand the fundamental concept behind evolution.

And even if you don't agree with evolution, you have to admit it has a hell of a lot more evidence than pretending someone's ghost is conversing with you.

[One-Way]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Your question already indicates that you don't understand the fundamental concept behind evolution.

And even if you don't agree with evolution, you have to admit it has a hell of a lot more evidence than pretending someone's ghost is conversing with you.

Thank you for writing that up for me and saving me a few seconds of my life.

[ArmSurvival]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Ok Arm, enlighten me...what do you believe ?

In a nutshell I believe life evolved through a long and arduous process starting with single-cell organisms which evolved into multi-cellular life. Multi-cellular organisms later branched off into different species depending on their environment and gene flow, among other things. This happened over the course of billions of years. Random mutation and natural selection are the processes which weeded out “unfit” organisms from the environment.

For example lets say you have a group of birds with many different types of beaks: Long, short, medium, etc. Now lets say they live in Region X, where the main source of food is hard-shelled nuts. The birds with shorter, sturdier beaks will be the only ones able to get to food sources and they are going to survive and breed while the ones with longer, weaker beaks are going to die out due to lack of nutrition. This means eventually the majority of the bird population will have short, sturdy beaks, and the more generations they breed the sturdier the beaks will become. Maybe after a couple million years they will be able to crack open coconuts with ease. Now if the coconuts contain vitamins and proteins that are new to the birds’ diet, maybe it will accelerate the growth of their brains. Fast forward another couple million years and you might have incredibly intelligent birds with very strong beaks that are able to set primitive traps to catch prey, like rodents, small foxes or baby deer. Not only do they have the brain power to form into groups using the advantage of being in the sky and watching the movement of their prey, they will have strong enough beaks to tear through flesh. Maybe this will introduce further beneficial vitamins which will accelerate their growth once again.

Now lets say we take that original group of birds, the ones with many different types of beaks. Lets say that instead of hard-shelled nuts, Region X's main source of food was insects hiding in grass, dirt, and bushes. This would favor the birds that have longer, weaker beaks, who can poke and prod into the vegetation much easier than the birds with shorter, stronger beaks. This would lead the species of bird into a completely different course of evolution than the first example I gave above.

It could even be that Region X has both hard-shelled nuts and plenty of insects in the vegetation. In this case you would have both short- and long-beaked birds surviving simultaneously. Long beaked-birds would mate and live with other long-beaked birds due to their similar lifestyle, and short-beaked birds would mate with short-beaked birds for the same reason. Fast forward millions of years and you might have very different species that have very little in common, even though they started off as the same species. This is the relationship that human beings have with other primate groups like monkeys, apes and chimpanzees. Its not that we “came from” monkeys, its that us and monkeys had a common ancestor and we each took a very different evolutionary course. This course was decided by our environments, the passage and expression of our genes onto subsequent generations, as well as accidents, natural disasters, and a huge number of other variables over the course of millions of years.

That’s just a very, very basic example of how the evolutionary process works.

[MrHyeSev]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Ok arm, here is a question I would like you to answer
who created single cell organisms?

[MrHyeSev]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

I found one of your songs SICK BEAT man

Thank you for writing that up for me and saving me a few seconds of my life.

[ArmSurvival]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

Ok arm, here is a question I would like you to answer
who created single cell organisms?

There are different theories as to how it happened, and some theories get discarded based on new knowledge we gain about the world through science. You can believe any theory you want, and there is much debate in scientific circles across a wide range of disciplines.

However, to say that you know with certainty how single cell organisms came into existence is a very different type of argument. Its not only the certainty with which you speak that makes it different than a scientific theory, its the fact that there is no evidence to back up the story. Not only that, there is no room for argumentation within religion. Maybe you personally are open to new arguments, but religions are not, and religion makes it less likely that you will be open to new arguments. This is why religion is backwards - Its a system where you are respected for believing something with no evidence whatsoever. Religion is also intolerant - No new evidence can alter the original belief. This would be okay if the religious kept this way of thinking to themselves. Unfortunately religion goes one step further when it states that we MUST believe these things or else we deserve to be punished.

Its no wonder that religion has given us absolutely no new knowledge about the universe we live in. Everything we know about the universe comes from scientific inquiry and skepticism. Think of any discovery that humans have made about the natural world or the universe - Did it come from scripture or divine revelation? Or did it come from human curiosity, testing, open discussion and free thinking?

[MrHyeSev]

Re: How Much of the Bible Must Be Historical to Believe?

There are different theories as to how it happened, and some theories get discarded based on new knowledge we gain about the world through science. You can believe any theory you want, and there is much debate in scientific circles across a wide range of disciplines.

However, to say that you know with certainty how single cell organisms came into existence is a very different type of argument. Its not only the certainty with which you speak that makes it different than a scientific theory, its the fact that there is no evidence to back up the story. Not only that, there is no room for argumentation within religion. Maybe you personally are open to new arguments, but religions are not, and religion makes it less likely that you will be open to new arguments. This is why religion is backwards - Its a system where you are respected for believing something with no evidence whatsoever. Religion is also intolerant - No new evidence can alter the original belief. This would be okay if the religious kept this way of thinking to themselves. Unfortunately religion goes one step further when it states that we MUST believe these things or else we deserve to be punished.

Its no wonder that religion has given us absolutely no new knowledge about the universe we live in. Everything we know about the universe comes from scientific inquiry and skepticism. Think of any discovery that humans have made about the natural world or the universe - Did it come from scripture or divine revelation? Or did it come from human curiosity, testing, open discussion and free thinking?

Ok, exactly so if you people can't prove a theory or a religion how can they believe in it. Religion= Man made rules that's why I don't believe in a religion, I believe in Christ which is a personal relationship with Christ.