Knight's POTD 01-03-2006

[Nathon Detroit]

Hi noguru,

I asked if you agreed with the Bible when it says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. You replied:

Do you mean these quotes; [snipped quotes] ... I think the ovreall thrust of these quotes is to equate "fear of the Lord" with respect for humility and the wisdom that is gained from humility.

Are you saying that actual "fear (reverence) for the Lord" is not in view, but rather is a metaphor for respecting a state of mind?

Notice how knowledge is used. Notice how humility, wisdom and understanding are used. Knowledge is not wisdom. Knowledge is not understanding. The knowledge that is gained from the wisdom of humility is understanding.

No one is conflating knowledge and wisdom. Do you believe that justified knowledge can be gained apart from reverence for Christ?

You wrote earlier:

Yes, Hilston's argument from Descarte's tongue;

"I believe in a literal inerrant Bible, therefore I can use logic."

OR

"I do not believe in a literal inerrant Bible, therefore I cannot use logic."

Perhaps my memory is failing me, but as far as I recall, never have I made any such arguments. I don't agree with them. Can you tell me why you wrote this?

Mr Jack

Hi Mr. Jack,

You write:

Frankly, Hilston, your choice of 'BS Evolutionist' should be beneath you.

You just don't know me well enough yet. Give me time. You'll see low I'm capable of stooping.

Your first question is missing the point.

I didn't make it up, Mr. Jack. Someone else made the comparision of confusing the evolution of medicine with Evolutionary biology. All I did was formulate it as a multiple choice question.

Of course I think that origin of life occured by naturalistic means sometime around 3.5-4 bya. But it is not something that can be explained by evolutionary theory.

Saga, Dawkins, Huxley and Dobzhansky all disagree with you.

The problem here is that you are treating evolution as if it were equivalent to creation as an explanation - it isn't.

On the contrary, I don't think there is anything that can stand up to the Creatonist explanation at all.

Evolution strives to explain things which creation doesn't, and doesn't explain things which creation tries to.

There is no "try." Evolution strives to explains things that are not problems. Evolution invented a problem in order to give man an "out" for having to answer to an intrusive Deity.

A complete history of life on earth does, of course, require an explanation of how life came into existence in the first place but this explaination is not, and cannot be, evolution.

If you're sticking to the evolution (lower case "e") v. Evolution (upper case "E") distinction, I agree with you. But that's not was Sagan et al were talking about.

At the moment, we don't have a coherant, well-understood or empirically justified explanation for the origin of life but this is not a criticism of evolution.

No, but it is a criticism of Evolution (u.c. "E").

Thanks for your post, Mr. Jack. It's good to hear from you.

aharvey

Hi aharvey,

You write:

Sorry you've been disappointed by this debate (as have I!), but please don't lose sight of the fact that it was Hilston's resolute refusal to discuss actual evidence that led us in this direction. ...

Did you read the debate, aharvey? Do you understand the problem with discussing evidence? If we both looked at evidence, we would agree right up until a conflicting assumption emerged. At precisely that point, we would be back to arguing worldviews. Pick an example; what evidence would you like to have seen discussed?

That is, the questions you ask haven't been discussed in this debate because Hilston won't go there ...

It's not that I won't go there. It's irrelevant. I don't disagree regarding the mechanism of evolution. I disagree about Evolution as an accounting for the diversity of life as we know it. You say you were disappointed in the debate. I'm not convinced you've read it , based on your comments here.

Air-cushion finish,
Jim

:rotfl:

You just don't know me well enough yet. Give me time. You'll see low I'm capable of stooping.

Great stuff!

:first:

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