Believers: why was your God so late on the scene?

[_ludwigm]

We've found their gods.

What do you mean? Whose gods? Everyone's gods? From everywhere?

For example a lot of Venus...

- of Willendorf



- of Hohle Fels (Schelklingen)



- of Dolní Věstonice

[_bcspace]

Never said they weren't intelligent. But you have to also ask yourself why did it take a quarter of a million years or more for homo sapiens to develop civilization?

It would take just as long if we all started over from scratch with our current learning erased. There are a lot of steps that precede developing civilization, not the least of which is agriculture.

This is actually testable though it would involve human babies placed in a sealed-off environment and watching their generations grow. I think you would lose this proposition.

Clearly the evolution of home sapiens did not include immediate knowledge of language and skills needed to build a civilization. Knowledge progresses slowly and was built sort of like that line upon line thing Mormons love to quote. It was like a snowball. Keep in mind there was civilization and even religion in the historic timeline before and Adam or Eve. Something like 11,000 years ago or so.

And if your theory is civilization started at the same time God placed a spirit child inside a homo sapiens then why did it take so many thousands of years for them to progress to modern technology. Based on your theory humans should have had cars, trains, planes and I phones thousands of years ago.

The fact that they didn't is evidence for my hypothesis. Homo sapiens had 250,000 years plus and only now are they just getting started. This is where God fits in. Somehow, we got a boost. A new and different type of spirit? A revelation of knowledge? etc. The atheist has a quarter of a million years to work with. I only have about 10,000 within which we have the rise and fall of civilizations and the loss and regaining of knowledge, etc.

[_Morley]

The fact that they didn't is evidence for my hypothesis. Homo sapiens had 250,000 years plus and only now are they just getting started. This is where God fits in. Somehow, we got a boost. A new and different type of spirit? A revelation of knowledge? etc. The atheist has a quarter of a million years to work with. I only have about 10,000 within which we have the rise and fall of civilizations and the loss and regaining of knowledge, etc.

So, you put the Garden of Eden at about 8,000 BCE?

And the Flood at about 6,000 BCE?

[_Jhall118]

Do they not get PBS in Utah anymore? Look up their special on human evolution. There's a wonderful part on culture. Needless to say, writing was HUGE. The average person ( such as pretty much everyone on this board) is STUPID. I mean, they will invent very little and have few important ideas. Every now and then, an Einstein is born and with luck, he figures something out. With writing, these ideas can be passed on to future generations. As humans settled and grew exponentially, so did the number of game changers. Before writing, their bright ideas, even if accepted, could not be transmitted to their own and other cultures well.

In short, the ability for humans to accurately remember and benefit from previous generations science, and expand on it, is the answer. Not a god speaking to the Israelites. I mean, have you read the Bible?

[_bcspace]

So, you put the Garden of Eden at about 8,000 BCE?

Sure. Why not?

And the Flood at about 6,000 BCE?

Perhaps a flooding of the Black Sea in 5600 B.C. The Thera volcano eruption and subsequent tsunami in 1600 BC seems to soon. A meteor or comet strike in the Indian ocean around 2800 to 3000 BC (Burckle Crater) and result tsunami seems plausible, etc. I like to trend closer to the mid 2000's B.C. as I think as you get closer to Abraham, the dates are more reasonably accurate. Abraham, if the relative Bible ages are correct (around Abrahma's time) and there are no missing generations, was born while Noah was still alive.

[_moksha]

Anyone?

Buffalo, the answer to all three questions in found in Joseph Campbell's Transformations of Myth through Time. Through the outward expanse of Mankind, change occurs over time in the retelling of sacred stories and changes in language. However, many of the original ideas remain and can be traced to a past known or unknown source.

[_msnobody]

I think that in God's infinite knowledge, He is right on time. Whether it is when Jesus was on earth or when He comes back or even God walking in the midst of the garden. Biblical scripture tells us that God has set eternity in the hearts of men. It also tells us that Satan masquerades as an angel of light and that men are tainted by sin. God's character and attributes do not change.

[_Buffalo]

This is actually testable though it would involve human babies placed in a sealed-off environment and watching their generations grow. I think you would lose this proposition.

Well, it's not practical to test. But there's no reason to think that modern humans would do any better than our ancestors 100,000 years ago, if we were deprived of the long accumulation of knowledge we've slowly built up.

Knowledge has always grown exponentially. Why, during our "civilization" years did it take so long to invent the internet? Did people before the 20th centuries not have souls?

[

The fact that they didn't is evidence for my hypothesis. Homo sapiens had 250,000 years plus and only now are they just getting started. This is where God fits in. Somehow, we got a boost. A new and different type of spirit? A revelation of knowledge? etc. The atheist has a quarter of a million years to work with. I only have about 10,000 within which we have the rise and fall of civilizations and the loss and regaining of knowledge, etc.

This is an argument from ignorance (your personal ignorance), and therefore fallacious.

[_Buffalo]

Do they not get PBS in Utah anymore? Look up their special on human evolution. There's a wonderful part on culture. Needless to say, writing was HUGE. The average person ( such as pretty much everyone on this board) is STUPID. I mean, they will invent very little and have few important ideas. Every now and then, an Einstein is born and with luck, he figures something out. With writing, these ideas can be passed on to future generations. As humans settled and grew exponentially, so did the number of game changers. Before writing, their bright ideas, even if accepted, could not be transmitted to their own and other cultures well.

In short, the ability for humans to accurately remember and benefit from previous generations science, and expand on it, is the answer. Not a god speaking to the Israelites. I mean, have you read the Bible?

And for a long time, there was very little chance for the highly intelligent to really do much with their intelligence. Physical strength would have been of more immediate use.

[_Buffalo]

I think that in God's infinite knowledge, He is right on time. Whether it is when Jesus was on earth or when He comes back or even God walking in the midst of the garden. Biblical scripture tells us that God has set eternity in the hearts of men. It also tells us that Satan masquerades as an angel of light and that men are tainted by sin. God's character and attributes do not change.

I'm not sure how this applies to the OP. Could you elaborate?