There are approximately 1.7 million scientifically described species on Earth... (1 Viewer)

[Jonesy77]

Just take Genesis out of the Bible. Much easier that way. I'd also nuke Job and Revelation while you're at it. Heck, pare it down to the Gospels and the Epistles, and you'll be much happier.

 

[Severum]

 

[Taurus]

If, for some weird reason, it's really, really important to you to believe that the story of Noah is absolutely, literally true, all you have to do is give yourself an Omni-Platinum Miracle Visa like God has. Use liberally and only mention one or two.

Voila.

Of course, a deity who'd do something like that is rather a meanspirited Spirit, but hey, can't have everything.

PS: I'd love to see this "evidence" your cousin comes up with. Might be fun.

 

[PurpleBlack&Gold]

If, for some weird reason, it's really, really important to you to believe that the story of Noah is absolutely, literally true, all you have to do is give yourself an Omni-Platinum Miracle Visa like God has. Use liberally and only mention one or two.

Voila.

Of course, a deity who'd do something like that is rather a meanspirited Spirit, but hey, can't have everything.

PS: I'd love to see this "evidence" your cousin comes up with. Might be fun.

I am not trying to believe the story. I think it's just a story. The best evidence I have seen to date is related to the age of the Earth in the partially unfossilized dinosaur bones that have been found recently. Though I still have not seen a confirmation that they actually found heme or anything that should not be there.

 

[Bishop]

I'm thinking Noah could've taken the most common animals of his region aboard a great ark, which may not have been many. I don't think he had kangaroos and pandas along with lambs and camels on board. Those people may have interpreted a 40 day and night catastrophic deluge to mean the world of their limited grasp was being flooded. Most hadn't ventured very far from their birthplace, or had been exposed to much news of far-flung lands. Many ancient cultures certainly assumed a volcano eruption, earthquake, etc was destroying the entire world.

 

[Taurus]

I am not trying to believe the story. I think it's just a story. The best evidence I have seen to date is related to the age of the Earth in the partially unfossilized dinosaur bones that have been found recently. Though I still have not seen a confirmation that they actually found heme or anything that should not be there.

This T-Rex?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/03/0324_050324_trexsofttissue.html

You'll note that instead of being a challenge to evolution or the age of the Earth, this find is seen as a challenge to our current understanding of the fossilization process.

 

[PurpleBlack&Gold]

This T-Rex?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/03/0324_050324_trexsofttissue.html

You'll note that instead of being a challenge to evolution or the age of the Earth, this find is seen as a challenge to our current understanding of the fossilization process.

Thats the one. I agree with you TPS. I am about as far from a creationist as you can get, but I am not an atheist. The only thing I know is that there is more going on than I understand and there are things that have happened in my life that lead me to believe in some higher power. What that is, I have no idea, but I most certainly don't subscribe to any religion. I am in the midst of reading that dinosaur thread in the archive, its great. It pretty much has what I was looking for in it. I was just looking to read some good debate on this topic and I found the mother load.

 

[CoolBrees1]

Purple...if you go back and re-read the chapter on the flood during Noah's time...you'll find that God specifically told Noah how many to take of the "Clean" and "Unclean" animals...so God was very specific of which animals to take on the ark...and then you'll have to understand which animals were considered "Clean" and "Unclean" to get a determination of how many actual animals were involved....

 

[TDH]

Watch this great Nova episode on the Dover trial of science vs. creationism. I watched it in Quicktime and click the Show All button to get the individual episodes to load automatically. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/id/program.html

 

[Furor]

Back when the stories in the bible were written, there wasn't world-wide CNN coverage every time it rained more than 2 inches in every third world country like there is now. If a flood happened, people may have assumed the whole world flooded...they had no way of knowing otherwise. If you were in the middle of NOLA during Katrina and had no contact with the outside world or knowledge that it was a hurricane or the Weather Channel to educate you that stuff like this happens occasionally, you would have had no idea that it wasn't happening everywhere.

The bible was written by people. The stories were told and retold many times before they were written down. Have you ever been able to get a story to stay original after being told from one person to another? The bible is not a science book, and it is not written by any god. It is written by people, and all the stories have the same problems that we have today with people embellishing and forgetting details, and outright making stuff up.

The bible is an interesting book, but as people are the source of the information, I will doubt its sources.

 

[Webmeistro]

The story of Noah was stolen from the Babylonians which was stolen from the Sumerians. Sorry to burst some bubbles, but very little about Genesis has anything to do with fact, and instead was inspired by the mythology of the region in which the early Hebrews lived at that time. Almost all tribes of that era borrowed mythology from each other as time went on.

The flood story is not unique in any way, shape, or form. They occur in almost all cultures because almost all civilizations are based around agriculture, which means a large enough water source, which usually means a river or lake, which means catastrophic flooding may occur.

 

[sykobob671]

if you really want to understand the Bible and Koran and other such ancient manuscripts i strongly recommend you read "The Power of Myth" by Joseph Campbell....he had a series with Bill Moyer back in the 80's on PBS that was truly enlightning...one of the best series ever produced on the subject of religion and myths, and how we all got to this point.....

 

[RSF]

 

[PurpleBlack&Gold]

The story of Noah was stolen from the Babylonians which was stolen from the Sumerians. Sorry to burst some bubbles, but very little about Genesis has anything to do with fact, and instead was inspired by the mythology of the region in which the early Hebrews lived at that time. Almost all tribes of that era borrowed mythology from each other as time went on.

The flood story is not unique in any way, shape, or form. They occur in almost all cultures because almost all civilizations are based around agriculture, which means a large enough water source, which usually means a river or lake, which means catastrophic flooding may occur.

I read about how the bible stories were created, by using older common stories that were told for hundreds of years before the bible was written, like Dionysus, the pagan deity that died and was resurrected and all that sort of thing. But thanks for the input.

if you really want to understand the Bible and Koran and other such ancient manuscripts i strongly recommend you read "The Power of Myth" by Joseph Campbell....he had a series with Bill Moyer back in the 80's on PBS that was truly enlightning...one of the best series ever produced on the subject of religion and myths, and how we all got to this point.....

I will look into this, thanks. This is the kind of understanding I am looking for.

 

[Superfan]

carbon dating can be inaccurate but when you take ice core samples creationist get owned.

all i know is i am god and the big bang happened when the soprano's ending happened in another dimension. Do not ask me how that is possible since you cannot question my judgement.