Quoting: "It's more like they accept the fact that they are made from the dust of the earth IN THE IMAGE OF GOD. That is the point. The substance that I'm created out of is immaterial to me because man is a living soul and the body is just the shell for this stay on earth. What I'm created out of does not define me. "
You offer a very odd statement. You object to a descriptive understanding that human and ape mammals are related via a common ancestry in our history.
I do not know what you mean "by being in the image of god". Your post seems to say "in the image of dust and dirt, from whom we were created". Maybe you did not mean this, but this is what I understand from your post.
I do not know what other image you refer to. Surely you do not mean that all of us look like God? Could you explain?
You say "The substance that I'm created out of is immaterial to me because man is a living soul and the body is just the shell for this stay on earth. What I'm created out of does not define me."
This has the ring of a theological argument, but is quite divorced from reality--we have bodies. What we are made of is quite clear--water, carbon-compounds, some nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfer, and a sprinkling of iron and other metals.
These combine wonderfully to make life everywhere, from bacteria to fish to mammals via natural processes. There does not seem to be a need to invoke a "supernatural force" to explain what we observe.
These combine wonderfully to make life everywhere, from bacteria to fish to mammals via natural processes. There does not seem to be a need to invoke a "supernatural force" to explain what we observe.
It depends what one is observing Thomas.
You look at the world and see -water, carbon-compounds, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfer, and a sprinkling of iron and other metals.
I look at the world and see these things trying to explain their own existence, absurd as it sounds in this context, but, an absurdity nonetheless that is true.
The dilemna for evolution is explaining something it fails to recognize in principle, and which we all know intuitively to be true: that our condition is profoundly unique, as opposed to any other organism on this planet.
I do not know what you mean "by being in the image of god". Your post seems to say "in the image of dust and dirt, from whom we were created". Maybe you did not mean this, but this is what I understand from your post.
Looks more like a misplaced clause. How about: in the image of God, from the dust of the earth. Perhaps either way it could be misinterpreted. There has been a lot of discussion about what the image of God means but I have never heard that anyone considers dirt to be the image of God. It could be physical but there is also the thought that it could be that we have a soul and spirit, although I am not sure where the dividing line between those is so don't bother asking. It could be that it's because we have a free will, or that we can reason, or have self awareness and consciousness. There are other non physical ways of being in someone's image.
This has the ring of a theological argument, but is quite divorced from reality--we have bodies. What we are made of is quite clear--water, carbon-compounds, some nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfer, and a sprinkling of iron and other metals.
It would have the ring of a theological argument because it certainly doesn't fall under what science can determine. I mean that science can anaylyze our bodies chemical composition but even then, a dead body would have all those characteristics, too. So what sets a living body apart? What is it that makes that group of chemical compounds think, love, hate, reason, enjoy, laugh, cry,.... ? How is it that chemicals coming together and then somehow becoming life and evolving could produce poetry, music, art, religion, and general awarenss and curiosity of the world around them? So what we are physically is quite clear; what it is that defines us as humans and sets us apart from the rest of the animal life is not from a scientific standpoint. That is not divorced from reality at all. That is reality.
RE:post 163 No, I am no Calvinist. I understand that Calvinism relates more to predeterming a person's salvation than determing every little detail of how the universe is run, although for a God who is able to create a whole universe, it doesn't seem to hard to manage that. It could very well be that some things were set on autopilot but that doesn't mean that God is still not ultimately in control and able to intervene whenever He chooses.
Randomness can be built into a system and is used in various fields regularly, so I suppose in one sense randomness can be predetermined but still be random.
In response to your post #169 that there are so many creation myths: I think that science has been able to disprove some. The ones like the infinitely tall stack of turtles or a gigantic man holding up the world. Since we have obviously been around the earth and seen that no such thing exists, it is not hard to disprove. Therefore you don't have to teach them all as viable alternatives and as equal because they aren't.