Posted on 09/20/2013 4:29:03 AM PDT by spirited irish
“Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son” (1 John 2:22).
“And the fifth angel sounded the trumpet, and I saw a star fall from heaven upon the earth, and there was given to him the key of the bottomless pit." (Rev. 9:1)
In his Concise Commentary Matthew Henry identifies falling stars as tepid, indecisive, weak or apostate clergy who,
"Having ceased to be a minister of Christ, he who is represented by this star becomes the minister of the devil; and lets loose the powers of hell against the churches of Christ."
John identifies antichrists, in this case clergy who serve the devil rather than Christ, sequentially. First, like Bultmann, Teilhard de Chardin, Robert Funk, Paul Tillich, and John Shelby Spong, they specifically deny the living, personal Holy Trinity in favor of Gnostic pagan, immanent or Eastern pantheist conceptions. Though God the Father Almighty in three Persons upholds the souls of men and maintains life and creation, His substance is not within nature (space-time dimension) as pantheism maintains, but outside of it. Sinful men live within nature and are burdened by time and mortality; God is not.
Second, the specific denial of the Father logically negates Jesus the Christ, the Word who was in the beginning (John 1), was with God, and is God from the creation of all things (1 John 1). In a pre-incarnate theophany, Jesus is the Angel who spoke “mouth to mouth” to Moses (Num. 12:6-9; John 9:20) and at sundry times and in many ways “spoke in times past to the fathers by the prophets, last of all…” (Hebrews 1:1) Jesus the Christ is the incarnate Son of God who is the life and light of men, who by His shed blood on the Cross died for the remission of all sins and bestowed the privilege of adoption on all who put their faith in Him.
Therefore, to deny the Holy Father is to logically deny the deity of Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, hence,
“…every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist . . . and even now already is it in the world” (1 John 4:3).
According to Peter (2 Peter 2:1), falling stars will work among the faithful, teaching damnable heresies that deny the Lord, cause the fall of men into unbelief, and bring destruction upon themselves:
“The natural parents of modern unbelief turn out to have been the guardians of belief.” Many thinking people came at last “to realize that it was religion, not science or social change that gave birth to unbelief. Having made God more and more like man---intellectually, morally, emotionally---the shapers of religion made it feasible to abandon God, to believe simply in man.” (James Turner of the University of Michigan in “American Babylon,” Richard John Neuhaus, p. 95)
Falling Stars and Damnable Heresy
Almost thirty years ago, two well-respected social science scholars, William Sims Bainbridge and Rodney Stark found themselves alarmed by what they saw as a rising tide of irrationalism, superstition and occultism---channeling cults, spirit familiars, necromancers, Wiccans, Satanists, Luciferians, goddess worshippers, 'gay' shamans, Hermetic magicians and other occult madness at every level of society, particularly within the most influential--- Hollywood, academia and the highest corridors of political power.
Like many scientists, they were equally concerned by Christian opposition to naturalistic evolution. As is common in the science community, they assumed the cause of these social pathologies was somehow due to fundamentalism, their term for authentic Christian theism as opposed to liberalized Christianity. Yet to their credit, the research they undertook to discover the cause was conducted both scientifically and with great integrity. What they found was so startling it caused them to re-evaluate their attitude toward authentic Christian theism. Their findings led them to say:
"It would be a mistake to conclude that fundamentalists oppose all science (when in reality they but oppose) a single theory (that) directly contradicts the bible. But it would be an equally great mistake to conclude that religious liberals and the irreligious possess superior minds of great rationality, to see them as modern personalities who have no need of the supernatural or any propensity to believe unscientific superstitions. On the contrary...they are much more likely to accept the new superstitions. It is the fundamentalists who appear most virtuous according to scientific standards when we examine the cults and pseudo-sciences proliferating in our society today." ("Superstitions, Old and New," The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. IV, No. 4; summer, 1980)
In more detail they observed that authentic ‘born again’ Christians are far less likely to accept cults and pseudoscientific beliefs while the irreligious and liberalized Christians (i.e., progressive Catholics, Protestant emergent, NAR, word faith, prosperity gospel) are open to unscientific notions. In fact, these two groups are most disposed toward occultism.
As Bainbridge and Stark admitted, evolution directly contradicts the Bible, beginning with the Genesis account of creation ex nihilo. This means that evolution is the antithesis of the Genesis account. For this reason, discerning Christians refuse to submit to the evolutionary thinking that has swept Western and American society. Nor do they accept the evolutionary theism brought into the whole body of the Church by weak, tepid, indecisive, or apostate clergy.
Over eighty years ago, Rev. C. Leopold Clarke wrote that priests who embrace evolution (evolutionary theists) are apostates from the ‘Truth as it is in Jesus.’ (1 John2:2) Rev. Clarke, a lecturer at a London Bible college, discerned that evolution is the antithesis to the Revelation of God in the Deity of Jesus Christ, thus it is the greatest and most active agent of moral and spiritual disintegration:
“It is a battering-ram of unbelief---a sapping and mining operation that intends to blow Religion sky-high. The one thing which the human mind demands in its conception of God, is that, being Almighty, He works sovereignly and miraculously---and this is the thing with which Evolution dispenses….Already a tremendous effect, on a wide scale has been produced by the impact of this teaching---an effect which can only be likened to the…collapse of foundations…” (Evolution and the Break-Up of Christendom, Philip Bell, creation.com, Nov. 27, 2012)
The faith of the Christian Church and of the average Christian has had, and still has, its foundation as much in the literal and historic meaning of Genesis, the book of beginnings revealed ‘mouth to mouth’ by the Angel to Moses, as in that of the person and deity of Jesus Christ. But how horrible a travesty of the sacred office of the Christian Ministry to see church leaders more eager to be abreast of the times, than earnestly contending for the Faith once delivered unto the saints (Jude 1:3). It is high time, said Rev. Clarke, that the Church,
“…. separated herself from the humiliating entanglement attending her desire to be thought up to date…What, after all, have custodians of Divine Revelation to do making terms with speculative Biology, which has….no message of comfort or help to the soul?” (ibid)
The primary tactic employed by priests eager to accommodate themselves and the Church to modern science and evolutionary thinking is predictable. It is the argument that evolution is entirely compatible with the Bible when we see Genesis, especially the first three chapters, in a non-literal, non-historical context. This is the argument embraced and advanced by mega-church pastor Timothy J. Keller.
With a position paper Keller published with the theistic evolutionary organization Bio Logos he joined the ranks of falling stars (Catholic and Protestant priests) stretching back to the Renaissance. Their slippery-slide into apostasy began when they gave into the temptation to embrace a non-literal, non-historical view of Genesis. (A response to Timothy Keller’s ‘Creation, Evolution and Christian Laypeople,” Lita Cosner, Sept. 9, 2010, creation.com)
This is not a heresy unique to modern times. The early Church Fathers dealt with this damnable heresy as well, counting it among the heretical tendencies of the Origenists. Fourth-century Fathers such as John Chrysostom, Basil the Great and Ephraim the Syrian, all of whom wrote commentaries on Genesis, specifically warned against treating Genesis as an unhistorical myth or allegory. John Chrysostom strongly warned against paying heed to these heretics,
“…let us stop up our hearing against them, and let us believe the Divine Scripture, and following what is written in it, let us strive to preserve in our souls sound dogmas.” (Genesis, Creation, and Early Man, Fr. Seraphim Rose, p. 31)
As St. Cyril of Alexandria wrote, higher theological, spiritual meaning is founded upon humble, simple faith in the literal and historic meaning of Genesis and one cannot apprehend rightly the Scriptures without believing in the historical reality of the events and people they describe. (ibid, Seraphim Rose, p. 40)
In the integral worldview teachings of the Fathers, neither the literal nor historical meaning of the Revelations of the pre-incarnate Jesus, the Angel who spoke to Moses, can be regarded as expendable. There are at least four critically important reasons why. First, to reduce the Revelation of God to allegory and myth is to contradict and usurp the authority of God, ultimately deny the deity of Jesus Christ; twist, distort, add to and subtract from the entire Bible and finally, to imperil the salvation of believers.
Scenarios commonly proposed by modern Origenists posit a cleverly disguised pantheist/immanent nature deity subject to the space-time dimension and forces of evolution. But as noted previously, it is sinful man who carries the burden of time, not God. This is a crucial point, for when evolutionary theists add millions and billions of zeros (time) to God they have transferred their own limitations onto Him. They have ‘limited’ God and made Him over in their own image. This is not only idolatrous but satanic.
Additionally, evolution inverts creation. In place of God’s good creation from which men fell there is an evolutionary escalator starting at the bottom with matter, then progressing upward toward life, then up and through the life and death of millions of evolved creatures that preceded humans by millions of years until at long last an apish humanoid emerges into which a deity that is always in a state of becoming (evolving) places a soul.
Evolution amputates the entire historical precedent from the Gospel and makes Jesus Christ unnecessary as the atheist Frank Zindler enthusiastically points out:
“The most devastating thing that biology did to Christianity was the discovery of biological evolution. Now that we know that Adam and Eve never were real people the central myth of Christianity is destroyed. If there never was an Adam and Eve, there never was an original sin. If there never was an original sin there is no need of salvation. If there is no need of salvation there is no need of a saviour. And I submit that puts Jesus…into the ranks of the unemployed. I think evolution absolutely is the death knell of Christianity.” (“Atheism vs. Christianity,” 1996, Lita Cosner, creation.com, June 13, 2013)
None of this was lost on Darwin’s bulldog, Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1985). Huxley was thoroughly familiar with the Bible, thus he understood that if Genesis is not the authoritative Word of God, is not historical and literal despite its’ symbolic and poetic elements, then the entirety of Scripture becomes a collection of fairytales resulting in tragic downward spiraling consequences as the Catholic Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation makes clear in part:
“By denying the historical truth of the first chapters of Genesis, theistic evolutionism has fostered a preoccupation with natural causes almost to the exclusion of supernatural ones. By denying the several supernatural creative acts of God in Genesis, and by downplaying the importance of the supernatural activity of Satan, theistic evolutionists slip into a naturalistic mentality which seeks to explain everything in terms of natural causes. Once this mentality takes hold, it is easy for men to regard the concept of spiritual warfare as a holdover from the days of primitive superstition. Diabolical activity is reduced to material or psychological causes. The devil and his demons come to be seen as irrelevant. Soon ‘hell’ joins the devil and his demons in the category of antiquated concepts. And the theistic evolutionist easily makes the fatal mistake of thinking that he has nothing more to fear from the devil and his angels. According to Fr. Gabriele Amorth, the chief exorcist of Rome, there is a tremendous increase in diabolical activity and influence in the formerly Christian world. And yet most of the bishops of Europe no longer believe in the existence of evil spirits….To the Fathers of the Church who believed in the truth of Genesis, this would be incredible. But in view of the almost universal acceptance of theistic evolution, it is hardly surprising.” (The Difference it makes: The Importance of the Traditional Doctrine of Creation, Hugh Owen, kolbecenter.org)
Huxley had ‘zero’ respect for modern Origenists and received enormous pleasure from heaping piles of hot coals and burning contempt upon them, thereby exposing their shallow-reasoning, hypocrisy, timidity, fear of non-acceptance, and unfaithfulness. With sarcasm dripping from his words he quipped,
“I am fairly at a loss to comprehend how any one, for a moment, can doubt that Christian theology must stand or fall with the historical trustworthiness of the Jewish Scriptures. The very conception of the Messiah, or Christ, is inextricably interwoven with Jewish history; the identification of Jesus of Nazareth with that Messiah rests upon the interpretation of passages of the Hebrew Scriptures which have no evidential value unless they possess the historical character assigned to them. If the covenant with Abraham was not made; if circumcision and sacrifices were not ordained by Jahveh; if the “ten words” were not written by God’s hand on the stone tables; if Abraham is more or less a mythical hero, such as Theseus; the story of the Deluge a fiction; that of the Fall a legend; and that of the creation the dream of a seer; if all these definite and detailed narratives of apparently real events have no more value as history than have the stories of the regal period of Rome—what is to be said about the Messianic doctrine, which is so much less clearly enunciated? And what about the authority of the writers of the books of the New Testament, who, on this theory, have not merely accepted flimsy fictions for solid truths, but have built the very foundations of Christian dogma upon legendary quicksands?” (Darwin’s Bulldog---Thomas Huxley, Russell Grigg, creation.com, Oct. 14, 2008)
Pouring more contempt on them he asked,
“When Jesus spoke, as of a matter of fact, that "the Flood came and destroyed them all," did he believe that the Deluge really took place, or not? It seems to me that, as the narrative mentions Noah’s wife, and his sons’ wives, there is good scriptural warranty for the statement that the antediluvians married and were given in marriage; and I should have thought that their eating and drinking might be assumed by the firmest believer in the literal truth of the story. Moreover, I venture to ask what sort of value, as an illustration of God’s methods of dealing with sin, has an account of an event that never happened? If no Flood swept the careless people away, how is the warning of more worth than the cry of “Wolf” when there is no wolf? If Jonah’s three days’ residence in the whale is not an “admitted reality,” how could it “warrant belief” in the “coming resurrection?” … Suppose that a Conservative orator warns his hearers to beware of great political and social changes, lest they end, as in France, in the domination of a Robespierre; what becomes, not only of his argument, but of his veracity, if he, personally, does not believe that Robespierre existed and did the deeds attributed to him?” (ibid)
Concerning Matthew 19:5:
“If divine authority is not here claimed for the twenty-fourth verse of the second chapter of Genesis, what is the value of language? And again, I ask, if one may play fast and loose with the story of the Fall as a “type” or “allegory,” what becomes of the foundation of Pauline theology?” (ibid)
And concerning Cor. 15:21-22:
“If Adam may be held to be no more real a personage than Prometheus, and if the story of the Fall is merely an instructive “type,” comparable to the profound Promethean mythus, what value has Paul’s dialectic?” (ibid)
After much thought, C.S. Lewis concluded that evolution is the central, most radical lie at the center of a vast network of lies within which modern Westerners are entangled while Rev. Clarke identifies the central lie as the Gospel of another Spirit. The fiendish aim of this Spirit is to help men lose God, not find Him, and by contradicting the Divine Redeemer, compromising Priests are serving this Spirit and its’ diabolical purposes. To contradict the Divine Redeemer is the very essence of unfaithfulness, and that it should be done while reverence is professed,
“…. is an illustration of the intellectual and moral topsy-turvydom of Modernism…’He whom God hath sent speaketh the Words of God,’ claimed Christ of Himself (John 3:34), and no assumption of error can hold water in the face of that declaration, without blasphemy.” Evolutionary theists are serving the devil, therefore “no considerations of Christian charity, of tolerance, of policy, can exonerate Christian leaders or Churches who fail to condemn and to sever themselves from compromising, cowardly, shilly-shallying priests”---the falling stars who “challenge the Divine Authority of Jesus Christ.” (ibid)
The rebuttals, warnings and counsels of the Fathers against listening to Origenists (and their modern evolutionary counterparts) indicates that the spirit of antichrist operating through modern rationalistic criticism of the Revelation of God is not a heresy unique to our times but was inveighed against by early Church Fathers.
From the scholarly writings of the Eastern Orthodox priest, Fr. Seraphim Rose, to the incisive analysis, rebuttals and warnings of the Catholic Kolbe Center, creation.com, Creation Research Institute, Rev. Clarke, and many other stalwart defenders of the faith once delivered, all are a clear, compelling call to the whole body of the Church to hold fast to the traditional doctrine of creation as it was handed down from the Apostles, for as God spoke and Jesus is the Living Word incarnate, it is incumbent upon the faithful to submit their wills to the Divine Will and Authority of God rather than to the damnable heresy proffered by falling stars eager to embrace naturalistic science and the devil's antithesis--- evolution. But if it seem evil to you to serve the Lord,
“…you have your choice: choose this day that which pleases you, whom you would rather serve….but as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15
Against whom do you propose to “defend” Dawkins’ right to express opinions? Dawkins’ right to express opinions has not been an issue with me. Again, we witness smoke making (great billowing clouds). This old naval tactic is very popular with politicians whenever they encounter any topic with which they lack the stomach to deal, which is as sure an indication as can be found, that issue is entirely about political domination, and has nothing to do with protecting the precious sanctity of scientific purity.
“For the obvious reason that we don't get a lot of "Obamatrons" posting here”
Oh, so you do agree with me that most posts pretending to represent Science, or to defend Darwinism, are pointless and in violation of Science principles.
“When a scientist speaks of his/her religious or metaphysical opinions, those are not, by definition, "scientific".”
The crux of the matter, and one I’ve held from the beginning, and the point you’ve attempted right along to obfuscate with much smoke making . . . great billowing clouds.
Now you say that you don’t have occasion, poor fellow, to deliver your opinion to Dawkins and his many acolytes, because you just don’t run in their circle, and post only in FR. There’s nothing to prevent you from correcting his fans on FR who assail his FR critics by directing everyone’s attention to the myriad Science heresies he commits when he directs his poisonous tongue to Judeo-Christians. So why don’t you? The strongest sentiments against Dawkins &co you’ve delivered, of which I am aware, have been here in this present thread in your agreement with me.
“Aquinas never addressed the question: what if science appears to tell us something in conflict with the Bible?”
What?! The quotes I provided from T. Aquinas, Of God and His Creatures, Book I, Chap. 7, address that very point. That should be obvious, but I suppose the philosophy and religion of Aquinas cannot be read and understood if it is treated as though it is a lab report form a peer-reviewed scientific paper.
“Science has nothing whatever to do with certitude”
You don’t need to convince me. Indeed, you do admit (as you should) that many are paid by the Regime and that we should not be surprised at their politics. And, of course, I am not surprised; merely disgusted at how easily they prostitute themselves, and how lightly they regard liberty and the salvation of their souls.
My reference to Marx stems, of course, from the fact that he was a historian, economist, sociologist, journalist, and philosopher (nonsense - he was the Mid-Eighteenth Century version of a community agitator), and was joyful to declare that the Theory of Evolution proved with scientific “certainty” that God never existed. And that is yet today the stance assumed by all Marxist acolytes (both public and closet). To all Socialist devotees and 0bamatrons (who seldom, if ever, even have a scientific or philosophic thought in their empty heads), the nonexistence of God is the one certain thing in an otherwise uncertain Universe; and it is Science that proves it. If this all this sounds rather psychotic, then understand it is nothing more than a view into the chaos of a Liberal’s mind, which is something akin to a view into an used baby diaper.
Since you seem to understand that my main objection is to Scientists of an Atheist persuasion, primarily if not entirely, who misrepresent themselves as speaking authoritatively, not personally, that Science proves God does not exist, why do you tell me all these things you apparently know I know?
“glaring Scientific heresy" refers to what, exactly?”
Heavens to Murgatroid! Of what have I been speaking almost incessantly on this thread if not the dishonesty of Scientists (and others) who present their opinions authoritatively, as though they are making factual statements about Science?
“so far as I can tell, that is not true of anything to do with evolution theory.”
Really?! From Marx to the present, it has ben the mantra of all Liberals/Socialists/0bamatrons, that it is Science generally, and The Theory of Evolution particularly, which “proves” that Capitalism and the Judeo-Christian God are both dead.
discern • verb • perceive or recognize (something)
Words mean things. Words are meant for communication. But, not for some. You cite “assumptions” as your reason to pass. Not wishing to further deal with an old naval tactic, I think I’ll pass too. Thanks.
The theory of evolution by natural selection: Natural selection is the gradual natural process by which biological traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of the effect of inherited traits on the differential reproductive success of organisms interacting with their environment.
For a given environment, assuming that the living population already exists and that there is a variation of genetic traits in that population, those traits that enable making more babies than the other traits become more common. Split the population in two and put the the two groups in different environments, you'll end up with two different sets of traits being selected for.
This is untestable?
"Soul: “The spiritual, rational and immortal substance in man, which distinguishes him from brutes; that part of man which enables him to think and reason.”"
Have you even looked at human history? Did you even read the Bible instead parroting what your pastor said? The romanticism of the early nineteenth century had sown the seeds of the West's destruction. It was the progenitor of progressivism. Your average low-information voter is a very base and instinctual being, the typical human.
"In conclusion, all three theories originated in the mind (spirit). As mind is a power of soul, then Darwinism, empiricism, and observationalism are spiritual."
The brain's function is determined by genetics, and since the mind is what the brain does, your instincts and personality (largely genetically determined) are based on inherited traits. Note that human population groups are in different environments. If you actually understand this and natural selection, the implications are going to be very, very, politically incorrect.
That would be good idea.
From Fyodor Dostoevsky and GK Chesterton to Thomas Molnar, Eric Voegelin and many other incisive, penetrating analytical thinkers, all have concluded that underlying natural science (all that exists is the natural or material dimension)and evolution are two spiritual pathologies:
1. the perennial utopian heresy (i.e., Nimrod’s Tower, communism, socialism and other new world order conceptions)
2. Gnostic dualism
Gnostic dualism holds that the material body into which divine sparks fell and are thus entombed are evil because all matter is evil. In the modern version, man is not fallen, he is not a sinner because his evil genes made him do it-—lie, cheat, swindle, murder, etc.
Gnostic dualism is a continuation of ancient pagan teachings along the same lines but with one major difference...it incorporates a paganized Bible and Christian theism. Thus it teaches that Yahweh is the evil demiurge responsible for creating matter while Lucifer is the first free thinker, the liberator of mankind, the seething energies of evolution, the angel of evolution and the Being of Light encountered by haters of Yahweh and other unbelievers during NDE’s and other OBE’s who lovingly tells them that heaven is for everyone.
Through evolution matter becomes progressively pure and perfect until the terminal point is reached: the spiritualized, divinized whole substance: Omega Point(heaven)
For the Gnostic who has willed his own emancipation because he is not fallen but rather possesses a particle of the divine, evolution is a system of self-perfecting.
Your refutation of my previous post exemplifies the peculiar dichotomy produced by Gnostic thinkers. The first three paragraphs are the work of an emancipated mind, free spirit, pure spirit, Transhumanist essence or pattern trapped within evil matter, or meat machine and it’s grey matter as expressed in the 4th and final paragraph:
“The brain’s function is determined by genetics, and since the mind is what the brain does, your instincts and personality (largely genetically determined) are based on inherited traits”
Well of course he recanted. After thinking over what he had admitted he no doubt realized that if what he said was true then his own thinking was the product of (mystical) genes and (mystical) chemicals. So what to do? Recant with the hope that no one would notice his blunder.
Darwinian materialists are today’s Kings with no clothes, in their case-—no minds. As soon as they open their mouths to officiously pontificate upon this or that they immediately self-refute everything they say. Worse, they bring this shame upon themselves publicly, just as the King did.
The theory of evolution by natural selection: Natural selection is the gradual natural process by which biological traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of the effect of inherited traits on the differential reproductive success of organisms interacting with their environment.
For a given environment, assuming that the living population already exists and that there is a variation of genetic traits in that population, those traits that enable making more babies than the other traits become more common. Split the population in two and put the the two groups in different environments, you'll end up with two different sets of traits being selected for.
What does the above do with "pure perfection"? That is completely irrelevant. Do I detect the Hamster in these replies?
Thank you so much for sharing your insights, dear sister in Christ!
Is that why you so consistently pollute all the conventions of meaning and communication? To get me, and people like me, to shut up?
Isn’t going to happen . . . pilgrim
I take it that your thesis is that “Gnostic dualism” denies free will (that is, denies personal responsibility for one’s actions), in agreement with Liberals, Moslems, and, perhaps, others. Thus the Liberals’ gentle treatment of those who “lie, cheat, swindle, murder, etc.”, because they, poor dears, just can’t help themselves (but, of course, not Conservatives and Christians, who apparently do, in this one instance, enjoy free will in their decisions about their religion and their personal philosophy).
I think you are correct.
Whatever world you live in where someone asking you for more information is "trying to get you to shut up", I'm glad it's there and not here.
Your words, "smoke making great billowing clouds" rather precisely describes your own postings here, which I have been carefully trying to cut through to find some core of argument worthy of response.
You may appreciate how difficult that is... ;-).
YHAOS: "Oh, so you do agree with me that most posts pretending to represent Science, or to defend Darwinism, are pointless and in violation of Science principles."
And again we see the "great billowing clouds" this time hoping to blow their way between my very words!
So let us begin with the fact that nobody I've ever seen on Free Republic defends Dawkins' religious opinions, except in his right to express them.
YHAOS: "The crux of the matter, and one I’ve held from the beginning, and the point you’ve attempted right along to obfuscate with much smoke making . . . great billowing clouds."
Sorry, but the "great billowing clouds" were your hors d'oeuvres, your entree and now, it appears, also your dessert.
Really, is there nothing else on your menu?
Nothing I've said is difficult to grasp, except for someone determined to misunderstand.
My point boils down to one simple idea: the word "science" refers only to: natural explanations for natural processes.
As soon as YHAOS or Dawkins or anybody else starts talking religion, it's not "science" any more.
YHAOS: "There’s nothing to prevent you from correcting his fans on FR who assail his FR critics by directing everyone’s attention to the myriad Science heresies he commits when he directs his poisonous tongue to Judeo-Christians.
So why don’t you?
In fact, there are no such "fans" posting of Free Republic, except in the projections of your own rather fertile imagination.
The most anybody here will do is just what I've done: defend Dawkins' right to express opinions, scientific or otherwise.
YHAOS: "The quotes I provided from T. Aquinas, Of God and His Creatures, Book I, Chap. 7, address that very point."
Sorry, but no.
Anything I've read from Aquinas assumes or asserts that religion and natural-science must be in harmony.
So far as I know, Aquinas never addressed questions later raised by, for example, Galileo Galilee -- when findings or theories of science seem to contradict scripture.
YHAOS: "You don’t need to convince me."
Then our areas of agreement may be larger than some of those "great billowing clouds" might suggest... ;-)
By the way I like your whole paragraph on Marx, expecially this:
Of course, "science" by definition cannot "prove" any such thing.
YHAOS: "Since you seem to understand that my main objection is to Scientists of an Atheist persuasion, primarily if not entirely, who misrepresent themselves as speaking authoritatively, not personally, that Science proves God does not exist, why do you tell me all these things you apparently know I know?"
Go back and reread my posts #41, #55 and #72 to see what they actually refer to.
YHAOS: "From Marx to the present, it has ben the mantra of all Liberals/Socialists/0bamatrons, that it is Science generally, and The Theory of Evolution particularly, which “proves” that Capitalism and the Judeo-Christian God are both dead."
Doubtless some do, but I've never seen that argument made by posters on Free Republic.
So how many times have I instructed you on the correct answer here: it's not "metaphysical nihilism", it's "methodological naturalism" that defines what is, and what is not "science"
If you cannot get that distinction straight in your mind, FRiend, you will be forever confused, and ranting insanely.
So work on it, until you grasp the idea.
Spiritual nihilism was not required, and was never practiced by many of our greatest scientists.
spirited irish: "Though Popper esteemed evolutionary theory and natural selection, he also honestly admitted that Darwinism is not a testable scientific theory but rather a metaphysical research program.
By this he means that not only is Darwinism of the spiritual dimension, but so are its’ two most important foundations, classical empiricism and the observationalist philosophy of science that grew out of it."
Then Popper is simply ranting insanely against science in general, from a religious/philosophical perspective -- all of which may, or may not, be entirely correct, but is irrelevant to what science actually is, and does: natural explanations for natural processes.
If Popper, or "spirited irish" say that science is inadequate to answer many philosophical questions, that's all well and good, but it's a little like criticizing a cat because it's not a dog.
Well, duh, no real cat wants to be a dog.
So, if you say it's not a dog, you are actually complimenting the cat, and so with science: to say that science can't answer religious-philosophical questions is simply to affirm that science is still doing what it was originally intended to do: provide natural explanations for natural processes.
spirited irish: "In conclusion, all three theories originated in the mind (spirit).
As mind is a power of soul, then Darwinism, empiricism, and observationalism are spiritual.
In short, all three theories are frauds.
They claim to be what they are not in order to obtain an advantage over the Genesis account of creation by imposition of immoral means.
Sorry, but that's just nonsense.
All of science (i.e., "Darwinism", "empiricism", and "observationsalism") is based on the assumption of "methodological naturalism".
Science itself makes no assumptions regarding philosophical, or ontological, or metaphysical naturalism.
All of that is stripped away from science and remains in the realms of philosophy or religious beliefs.
So, if you wish to assert that Genesis is a more accurate description of Creation than various scientific hypotheses (i.e., "Big Bang", evolution, etc.), that is your perfect right, provided you don't pretend your beliefs are somehow "scientific", since they are not.
Oh really, dear R7 Rocket?
This is a most sweeping claim. So I just need to ask you a question: How do you know that? On what evidence do you depend to come up with this conclusion?
Please give me a thorough briefing on this matter. for I find your statement totally perplexing.
What you are saying is that mind is merely an epiphenomenon of physico/chemical processes in the brain. This claim is so sweeping, that I really do demand to see your evidence for it. For epiphenomena are thought to have zero causative effect on anything. Yet it seems quite evident to me that minds are capable of changing the ways that human beings decide and act. And I am to suppose to think that this is some sort of fluke of brain chemistry???
And while you're thinking that over (I hope), here are some other questions I have for you:
Do you believe that the evolution of human beings is essentially random? That the only power in nature that can establish anything new in biology is environmental pulls of Nature itself ("natural selection"), acting on accidents of mutation? (Which are usually fatal to organisms afflicted by such mutations?)
Another question: Do you believe there is any such thing as human nature itself? That is, that human nature might somehow be a "given" in Nature, and not a product of some (fictitious) evolutionary process?
If you check the history of the human race, you will find that, over thousands and thousands of millennia (judging from the historical record), that human beings qua human beings do not change much over time. I find it positively striking that whether you are consulting records from ancient Egypt, through classical philosophy, through Judeo-Christian writings, or just reading the 14th-century writer Boccaccio (See: The Decameron), the same human problems and concerns always emerge as the same over all historical time. The human "picture" seems never to change.
So, how does Darwin's theory help us to understand ourselves? Answer: It doesn't. It just changes the subject entirely. It says there is no human "nature." Man is "unfinished business," just leave it up to Nature to "complete" him. The next thing you know, the way things are going, is that Man will "evolve" into a machine, or "devolve" into a sub-human, vicious predator. And as long as we can blame his "brain" for doing all this, then Man is not responsible for what happens to him or to his species or the very world around him, which he profoundly influences by his thoughts ands actions. "Nature did it!!!"
If man suffers from this disordered understanding, if his societies deconstruct into chaos and strife as a result, then it's okay: "Nature did it," not man.
Man is responsible for nothing if he is but the pawn of the activities of his bodily chemistry.
And oh, by the way, where did DNA come from? Is that an "accident" too, just another evolutionary process?
Looking forward to hearing from you. Thank you for writing!
Your thoughts????
God bless!
The “Who me?” defense. The final resort of definitions shape shifters.
It’s all there in the thread. Have whatever kind of tantrum you want about it. I’ve got work to do.
Oh wow, I didn’t even know you were ‘having a tantrum’! Where’s the attendant when you need a program to follow the fizzles? LOL
I would like for someone to explain to me the allegorical meaning of “In the beginning” or “Thou shalt not steal.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4us_zaIW7mE
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