8.7 Million Species

[_Hoops]

.

Not at all.

Yes, a total dick or a total douche. Take your pick.[/quote]
Neither one is applicable.

[_Some Schmo]

If one believes in a literal interpretayion of the Bible, then one also has to believe that God is a total dick.

Yes, and also that "total dick" is code for "loving god who has a plan we mere mortals don't understand."

So, to review... if I kill everything on the planet save two of every species, I'm either a total dick or a loving god.

[_Everybody Wang Chung]

Hoops,

Why would your petty, vengeful, jealous, murderous, Desert God be worthy of anyone's respect or devotion?

[_Chap]

The first quotation is about mountains falling, as an illustration of the things we shall not be alarmed by if we have God to support us, and the second simply says that God has been there from well before anything was made. I know the first Psalm pretty well by heart in the Prayer Book version "God is our hope and strength'

See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWDPXuHnPKU

I understand your position. However, a fair and literal reading points to Noah's flood. After all, "its" refers to the earth. And when would "its" waters roar and foam? Certainly one can reasonably conclude during the flood.

... and the second is a childhood memory in its metrical version: "Before the hills in order stood/Or earth received her frame/From everlasting, Thou art God/To endless years the same."

I see that as well. But this can also be read as the mountains and earth were created at different times. One could argue, forcefully I believe, that as Noah's flood, if true, was the single most significant geological event, then the reasonable explanation for when the mountains were created would be at this time.

I have to say, in all honesty, that even when I was a religious believer I would have shaken my head at arguments of the kind you put forward here.

Unlike Psalm 104, there does not seem to be even the slightest pretext for making these Psalms refer to Noah's flood specifically, apart from the fact that you need a proof text, and you have already rejected Psalm 104, which is the one most widely used for this purpose.

The first psalm is clearly hypothetical 'even if awful things were to happen, like waters raging' we shall not be scared, even if it gets so bad that mountains collapse' - and why do you think Noah's flood was the only possible event in the Psalmist's mind in which waters might 'rage and swell'? Do you think he had never seen a storm at sea?

Your argument on the second psalm you quote uses a modern understanding of 'geological event' that seems quite anachronistic. God creating stuff is not a 'geological event'.

In both cases, your conclusion seems to me to be imposed on the text by your assumptions. Can you find any biblical commentator who has ever agreed with your interpretations? I suspect not. Does that not give you pause?

[_Buffalo]

If one believes in a literal interpretayion of the Bible, then one also has to believe that God is a total dick.

Not at all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mk1owD9y1hc

[_Jason Bourne]

I hope my substantive post above shows that I am not one of those.

they do not

.

Indeed, on the face of our posts I think I have demonstrated that I know the parts of the Bible we are discussing at least as well as you do

I disagree.

- and in one case better, in that you thought mistakenly that the killing of animals began after the Flood, not after the Fall.

I made a mistake, yes. Thank you for pointing that out to me

I also knew what Psalm you were referring to on the matter of mountains 'rising up', when you had forgotten.

I missed that. Do you have a post #?

I note that you make no response to my substantive, well documented and I think eirenic post, but respond instead to posts that you feel you can answer in one-liners of a dismissive nature.

Of course. I have little interest in giving you a platform for your snarkiness. I'm happy to discuss it with you, if that's what you wish. But you are more concerned with making rhetorical points, not a give and take. You and Buffalo are cut from the same cloth.

Are you really in this for serious discussion of the Bible, or just to sneer at unbelievers? If the latter, I think you should ask yourself whether you may not be placing stumbling-blocks by giving the impression that being an EV Christian implies being intolerant of dissent, uninterested in real discussion of relevant evidence, and uncharitable towards unbelievers. Just saying.

Your feigned indignation is laughable. And I am, indeed, lauging. When you bother to take the time to actually engage what I write then that might be some indication that you wish to discuss the matter. Until then, you're just another atheist/humanist/agnostic blowhard. I have litte patience for those.

Honestly I think you are all wet (no pun intended) on this one Hoops. Chap certainly has interacted responsibly with you and provided reasonable well thought out cogent ideas and responses. You on the other hand give your typical quips and one liners and have offered little substance other than you think you apparently know the Bible story better than anyone else. Certainly even taking the Biblical account on it face (animals suddenly changing to meat eaters, all human races and number from 8 persons in a relatively short period of time) has problems from a scientific stand point.

And from an observers view point, and that from one who really became disillusioned with LDS apologetics, you have shown me that Christian defenses of biblical problems is not any better, and in your case here much worse. And I really have been reading this with interest. Indeed you really have come off on this thread as:

giving the impression that being an EV Christian implies being intolerant of dissent, uninterested in real discussion of relevant evidence, and uncharitable towards unbelievers.

Dismiss me as well if you wish. But I am one actually who is interested in Christian apologetics and to see how they handle the difficult issues I have run into as I look at Christian doctrine with the same critical eye I have LDS and that with an attitude hoping it does much better.

[_The Nehor]

I hadn't thought about coconuts.

I'm guessing that if the Bible was true, all the plants in my garden would be variations of coconut palms. Of course, this would be a testament to the validity of evolution. Roses from coconuts.

But then surely you could have African and/or European swallows carrying the (smaller-then-coconuts) seeds needed to re-seed the earth.

[_Quasimodo]

I hadn't thought about coconuts.

I'm guessing that if the Bible was true, all the plants in my garden would be variations of coconut palms. Of course, this would be a testament to the validity of evolution. Roses from coconuts.

But then surely you could have African and/or European swallows carrying the (smaller-then-coconuts) seeds needed to re-seed the earth.

You have to know these things to be King.

[_Hoops]

I have to say, in all honesty, that even when I was a religious believer I would have shaken my head at arguments of the kind you put forward here.

Of course. I can't help that though.

Unlike Psalm 104, there does not seem to be even the slightest pretext for making these Psalms refer to Noah's flood specifically, apart from the fact that you need a proof text, and you have already rejected Psalm 104, which is the one most widely used for this purpose.

I specifically stated that Ps 104 had relevance. And you wonder why I don't think you're reading?

The first psalm is clearly hypothetical 'even if awful things were to happen, like waters raging' we shall not be scared, even if it gets so bad that mountains collapse' - and why do you think Noah's flood was the only possible event in the Psalmist's mind in which waters might 'rage and swell'?

How in the world is anything "clearly hypothetical"? I come from the perspective, firstly, that when the text speaks of raging waters and such, I think it's refering to raging waters. I'm not sure why that is not reasonable to take the text for what it is.

Your argument on the second psalm you quote uses a modern understanding of 'geological event' that seems quite anachronistic. God creating stuff is not a 'geological event'.

I'm not sure of your disagreement here. I'll grant you that I was using the term "geological event" loosely, let's call it a weather event then of such proportions as to potentially impact the earth in a significant and permanent way.

[_Milesius]

Actually, yes, good for you. Science should be arrogant. It has an amazing track record of getting things right and improving the lives of people.

Also, I don't really agree with the whole Jesus idea that humility is necessarily a good thing. Many of the people who have advanced the world have been pretty damn sure of themselves. From an atheist perspective, I don't see a good argument for humility, at least in all cases.

Keep teaching your 8 year old to be arrogant! :)

Yes, that is one of the things wrong with you.