Modern creationism makes no sense

Post Reply New Topic

Um.... I am not saying that Dinosaurs are invincible. I am saying that most of our histories, human history including, have things overlapping and existing before that period around 4400 years ago. I mean, the direction that this kind of idea wants us to go is to throw out our current understanding of human history, geology, cosmology, biology, and so on and so forth that it is absurd. It literally is a conspiracy theory against everyone that everything we know and believe is wrong, I mean, what the heck??? At what point do we think that the entire endeavor is akin to the conspiracy theorist who holds that aliens are beaming enlightenment into his brain? At least 9/11 truthers aren't in a crusade to destroy everything for their idol.

In terms of actual and somewhat reliable secular written history, we have less than 10,000 years at the most (Edit: I'm referring to recorded history, the time period of which it spans). Yes, if Abraham were placed where Ussher had him in regard to secular history, then the flood would have occurred at about 4,004 BC- 1656 or 2348 BC. However, the period of the Judges is somewhat undefined, that is the time period between the Conquest of the land of Canaan and the beginning of the monarchies of Saul and David, during which time in between the people of Israel lived, basically, in Anarchy and "did whatever was right in their own eyes".

Yes, but you have to include a flood, and it is often claimed that a massive flood is what changed the earth in massive ways, and given that you are very unlikely to have pre-flood history of any sort, and I don't think anybody is going to buy the notion that all history must be written history, and if we don't, then you know that the dates will go longer. Even further, you seem to ignore the issues of movement of people. People, are not likely to move or breed quickly enough to cover what is needed, particularly given that we need them to cross oceans and massive continents while still having lots and lots of sex and not suffering from factors limiting birth rates(the issue is that those would have to be necessary to have the very significant differential breeding rates required for existing human genetic diversity. An additional problem is that a post-flood world is going to massively lack plant-life, as most can't stand being under tons of pressure of the sort necessary to create rocks, swept around by massive rain, or being underwater for 40 days straight, and this seems particularly bad for isolated island continents, such as the Americas and Australia, because Noah's ark might contain some form of seeds, but Noah's ark is not going to be near those other locations, so they can't grow back. Unless we say that a magic man done it, we're probably going to see a lack of plants and this probably is going to be a major limiting factor on the movement of animals and people. Even further, animals native to islands, such as the Americas and Australia aren't going to be able to get there from a Noah's ark that likely resides in the Middle East or somewhere close(guessing given that this is a Jewish story), and even if they could, they probably wouldn't only congregate there given that animals are as opportunistic as people. So, I mean, we should see kangaroo fossils everywhere on the world if the story were true, unless we are going to say that "God herded them to Australia for unknown reasons"

I dunno, maybe I am completely missing the mark, but this seems like utter bollocks. Like I already said, you are positing a conspiracy theory that includes almost every single modern academic. It also sounds like a fairy tale, not in how amazing it sounds, but rather in how ridiculous it is. A precocious child could possibly see through it.

Flood: most religions have an account of the Flood, however distorted.
Breeding: Although the patriarchs after the flood have, except for Eber, only one of their offspring listed, the usual time for fathering to began was around 35. Also, the Preflood patriarchs remaining, Noah, Shem, Ham, & Japheth, were still around for a while and would be able to pass on knowledge and skills, including shipmaking.
Location of the Ark: Building materials and firewood, most likely.
Australia: prior to the Flood Australia would not have been separated from the supercontinent. After the Flood, men in ships are probably a primary source of transportation. There could have been a land bridge allowing some species to cross, and many of the birds could have flown.

Floods are common, and the stories are very dissimilar.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CG/CG201.html

So, I kind of doubt that your reason is the best at all.


Um.... ok? But rushing off to build a ship to America is just slightly absurd, especially since it would take a really long time for all the trees to grow back.


You do realize that only after the flood is important.

Also, you also realize that your claim is still incredibly ad hoc, as yes, a land-bridge is possible, but why the heck were they all herded over to Australia? Why would they not also try to hang out on other places? Even further, even if they rushed, all the plants should be dead due to a world wide flood. They'd have nothing to eat, and the predators would either kill their prey or starve to death before the foodchain even got back in order enough for things to work.


I mean, seriously, your entire idea can only be kept afloat with all sorts of random invocations of "God did it", which makes it an ad hoc theory. It isn't hard for anybody to invent a theory that can be rationalized against any massive internal consistency problem, and young earth creationism has a lot of those. In short, it is BS, and obviously BS.

As far as the flood goes, the Bible isn't alone. What about the Epic of Gilgamesh? There are some striking similarities.

I'm not sure I understand what the whole ad hoc problem is. You like to casually throw that around, as though on its own merits it makes everything you don't like reductio ad absurdum. The thing is, it's NOT a problem. From a Christian perspective, EVERYTHING either has specific purpose or a specific purpose is acted out through given circumstances. Could it be that the idea is kept afloat by "God did it" because, well, God actually did it??? And you're also missing that, by your words, "anybody to invent a theory that can be rationalized against any massive internal consistency problem," your own ideas are subject to the same principle and are equally crap.

There are also striking location issues, such as both being from the middle east. I doubt that this is a case of completely separate developments. In fact, some scholars think that Noah's ark is based upon Gilgamesh. (not that Gilgamesh happened, only that the author copied the story)


Well, right, and you could make the same argument for a story. The problem is that if the author solves EVERYTHING deus ex machina, then you know the story either has to be a comedy or crap. The Bible was not meant as a comedy as far as I could see, and if the story of the Bible is crap and makes little real sense, then that says a lot about God.

Ad hoc is also a problem because human beings don't act in an ad hoc manner unless they have forgotten something, or are foolish or something else. Instead, the use a parsimony of action and try to do things in a simple sensible manner. A God that does a lot of crazy BS, and then has to do more crazy BS to fix the problems of the last set of crazy BS isn't what I would consider to be an intelligent actor. Any theistic theory demands not only that God is an intelligent actor, but that he is the MOST intelligent actor.

Finally, if you are arguing that this is a scientific theory, then one of the criterion that people look for in evaluating science is AD HOCNESS! Which means, that if I just keep on saying "that's ad hoc, and that's ad hoc" and all of my claims are correct, then there isn't a snowball's chance in hell that creation is a tolerable theory at all. Certainly not an equal of evolution, because ad hocness also gives the ability to explain ANY hypothetical occurrence. If creation can explain ANYTHING, then it explains NOTHING.

No, I'm done with any kind of scientific pursuits for the time being, as I've already said. I just think it's odd that you wave the ad hoc flag so often. I can understand that, because I get stuck on things to as part of my condition. It just turns out that lately I have fewer things to obsess over and end up wasting valuable time in the PPR forum. I'm wondering whether dismissing things so much on the grounds of being ad hoc might not be an indicator that perhaps things aren't quite as ad hoc in reality. It's like a teacher who flunks over half the class--the issue become not so much whether the students can learn, but whether the teacher can teach. I mean, we're deviating somewhat beyond the realm of science and more on the grounds of religion here, and you can't apply the same rules. I'm wondering whether you're still being objective--your particular brand of vehemence suggests otherwise.

I'm not sure I understand how you apply that when you say "if creation can explain ANYTHING..." Evolution explains. Does that then mean evolution explains nothing, also? I'm not trying to pick apart what you said to make a point or anything--it's more likely I'm just not taking it the way you meant it, so clarification would be in order.

I don't think it odd. I am dealing with nonsense.

I don't understand this reasoning: "I'm wondering whether dismissing things so much on the grounds of being ad hoc might not be an indicator that perhaps things aren't quite as ad hoc in reality."
It doesn't make sense, particularly given that the more ad hoc things we posit, the less we can understand.

"I mean, we're deviating somewhat beyond the realm of science and more on the grounds of religion here, and you can't apply the same rules."
Actually, the more we can apply these rules the better. Philosophers also value not being ad hoc as well, as Occam's razor is one of their ideas as well.


You've continually attacked my vehemence, and honestly, my response is that utter nonsense angers me. I don't think I claim to actually be objective, but rather to strive for intellectual honesty. (maybe I slipped somewhere in the thread though, as "objective" is too common so it slips off of the tongue)


What I mean is that in order for a theory to explain something, there has to be something that could hypothetically happen that the theory could not explain. This is one of the reasons for the idea of falsificationism in science. The reason for this is that if all states of affairs are explained by our explanation, then our explanation really doesn't tell us anything, because any fact would fit, and we'd get the same explanation. To explain something we have to have different facts requiring different explanations, otherwise I could just say "stuff happens" can call it the theory of everything.

You mean like string theory? Although to be honest, the first time someone tried to explain string theory to me, I laughed at them because I thought they were joking.

Yeah, string theory is often very very very questioned on its scientific credentials.

You ought to ad hoc flag Einstein then too, for his Cosmological constant.

Heck, the 9/11 conspiracy theories and a wide range of other crackpot ideas are significantly more parsimonious than YECism.

Identifying a constant to insert into a mathematical equation to explain the workings of the universe isn't even on the same level of "Oh, I'm going to herd the kangaroos onto Australia for NO APPARENT REASON!"

I mean, the problem is that your idea is just laughably ridiculous. Honestly though, at first Isaac Newton WAS attacked for his constants, the scientific community later accepted them though because they WERE explanatory, and because at the present point in time this gap seemed an acceptable trade-off. Your idea explains almost nothing and contains so much ad hocness that we have more tape and glue than theory, period.

There's more than just Kangaroos in Australia though, there's an entire range of marsupials which, I think, seem to have been selected to be there. Australia isn't the only place they can exist either. Parrots also are abundant there, in great variety, but parrots are fairly ubiquitous also. There's plenty of unique types of them in Australia, and New Zealand, but they are practically all throughout the world as well, similar to the range of rats and mice.

Do you even know about fudge factors and fanagle's constants? Do you know that an ad hoc addition to a theory or argument is not "instant kill" or "headshot" or "pwnage" or however you think... although here you have predetermined to consider everything in favor of the Biblical models of creation to be nonsense and thereby forgo the usage of your mind so thinking is actually out of the question for you in this matter. Perhaps putting things in economic terms would illicit some cogitation on your part, but even still you have acknowledged your intended participation in this argumentation is merely to constantly declare what you have thought to be "nonsense" a priori.

Yes, I know there are more than just kangaroos in Australia, they were chosen because they are a distinctive animal.


Yes, I do actually. I also already admitted that Isaac Newton's theory was attacked on ad hocness but survived due to explanatory power, so I am aware of this issue.

The issue is that while a video game character can take a few bullets, they still have to beware the machine guns and the shotguns.

Yeah..... because you, a cult devotee, are really going to be the clear-headed one. These ideas are dead. They're widely considered outright nonsense. Now, you can say that I am "unthinking", but I have put more cogitation into this than you have ya fool. The problem isn't that "oh this is slightly ad hoc", the problem is that this is "nonsense", as I already said.

If you could create an economic model for God, then go ahead. I'll listen, but such a model will still likely be nonsense. I mean, heck, first tell me how a timeless being can have utility. I'll probably take the analysis by Ludwig von Mises on the matter as close enough to my word on the issue:
"Scholastic philosophers and theologians and likewise Theists and Deists of the Age of Reason conceived an absolute and perfect being, unchangeable, omnipotent, and omniscient, and yet planning and acting, aiming at ends and employing means for the attainment of these ends. But action can only be imputed to a discontented being, and repeated action only to a being who lacks the power to remove his uneasiness once and for all at one stroke. An acting being is discontented and therefore not almighty. If he were contented, he would not act, and if he were almighty, he would have long since radically removed his discontent. For an all-powerful being there is no pressure to choose between various states of uneasiness; he is not under the necessity of acquiescing in the lesser evil. Omnipotence would mean the power to achieve everything and to enjoy full satisfaction without being restrained by any limitations. But this is incompatible with the very concept of action."
-Mises Human Action, Chapter 2, section 11.