AJ,
>> if a doctor tells you that you’re fine, when in fact you actually have terminal cancer, that’s comforting, but it doesn’t mean it’s true.<<

That is why I said that terms like ‘truth’ etc. are unambiguous in philosophically trivial situations. Such a naive understanding of truth will not suffice in contemporary philosophy of science, even with the falsification principle (especially after the advance of QF), so you cannot expect it to be sufficient when asking philosophical questions about religious outlooks.

>> when some Christians find it impossible to type the word “truth” (in regards to Biblical truth), without starting it with a capital ‘T’.<<

Normally, capitalisation of an abstract word means that you have in mind a different meaning of the word, as much as it might relate to, or be derived from, its uncapitalised version. You have ‘Catholic‘ (referring to a church) and catholic, meaning universal, and of course you know that in Australia one speaks of “small el” liberals to distinguished them from the political party.

Capitalisation in religious treatises, or in metaphysics when dealing with an “Ultimate Reality“ (my favourite capitalised words), is an indication that one does not mean their uncapitalised, trivial, counterparts, and one does not want to (or cannot) spell out the difference.

Yes, one can speak of Truth to indicate something (or Something) that is a priori accepted within the context of a religious discourse (and to distinguish it from the everyday use of the word, like in your example of the terminal cancer patient).

Since faith (religious) is a state of mind attainable by a philosophically sophisticated as well as a rather naive person, you have to have understanding for the latter who can grasp Truth only if he/she equates it with truth naively understood.

For instance, in mathematics you have words, like space, function, map etc., that have specialised meanings, only loosely related to the way they are used in everyday language. They are not capitalised, apparently because there is normally no danger of them being misunderstood by somebody who does not understand the language of mathematics.

Thanks, George, for the review of the Ayala book. Though I usually take what comes out of the AAAS and NAS cautiously given their past records. I would be interested in more detail about what was said towards the end regarding the difficulties of the current population arising from a small population. It may make for an interesting investigation. I notice the rabbit population seems pretty robust considering it started from pretty small numbers in Victoria not that long ago.

Summary statements such as this one quoted by Relda are pretty bold, "there is probably no other notion in any field of science that has been so extensively tested and corroborated as the evolutionary origin of living organisms". However such statements are a little out of line with reality. If these notions have been so extensively tested and corroborated, why are such institutions having trouble convincing much of the public at large about their validity? I would suggest it is because they are philosophically driven, not empirically. The more incapable these notions are to convince, the bolder these statements become.

I’ve heard elsewhere that the most confirmed and attested notion in all of science is the 2nd law of thermodynamics, which is by no means a friend of evolution. But can I put this statement to a test? If the evolutionary origin of living things is so extensively corroborated, can we state one single fact about such origins that we can put on display as evident and beyond question?

AJ,
With regards to Christian fears and motivations, all ought to have a healthy respect for God and the consequences of rebellion against him. By analogy, I have a healthy fear of crossing the road. I don’t take it lightly, but I also don’t live in fear of cars. That you are always referring back to certain fears seems to betray what is going on in your own psychology since departing the church.

As for religion stifling curiosity and creativity, try answering this: name a branch of modern science, e.g. genetics, physics, that wasn’t pioneered by a Bible believing Christian. I suggest most were. Modern science was born out of the Christian mind set of Western Europe.

You said theists have failed to accept basic logic provided on this thread. If you could provide an example of anything in this line, I’d be interested to see it.

The assertion has been made be de Merengue that the roots of modern science come from Bible believing Christians.

Science is not restricted to any religious belief. Physics, biology and many other branches of the natural and physical sciences came from the writings of Aristotle born 384 BC. His speculations built on the work of others. It is rare that one person can be said to have founded a science. However, the founder of chemistry as a science is generally acknowledged to be Jabir ibn Haiyan, a Muslim Arab of Yemeni extraction who was born in 722.

Modern physics can be said to be the product of the brain of the Jew, Albert Einstein, whose ideas of time and space revolutionized classical physics.

Modern biology rests on evolutionary theory which was based on the work of Darwin and Wallace. Darwin was raised to be a Bible believing Christian but gave it up. Wallace was a spiritualist.

Astronomy has preChristian roots. Eratosthanes measured the circumference of the earth within 1% of the currently accepted figure. He was born in 273 BC.

The fate of such scientists as Servetus who was burned at the state by Calvinists and Galileo who was imprisoned by Catholics is well-known.

Bible believing Christianity does not encourage the spirit of inquiry which is necessary for a scientist although there are cases where it has not succeeded in stifling it.

George,

Good points about the capitalisation. But personally, I've also known of it to be used because it is believed to the ultimate truth: 'The Truth'. A truth supposedly truer than all other truths.

Thanks for the hints about using certain words that could potentially become philosophical trivia. But I think your words: “...philosophically trivial situations” demonstrate that they are just that: Trivial. Personally I would view them as relatively unimportant in most situations.

Dan,

<<...2nd law of thermodynamics, which is by no means a friend of evolution.>>

This is yet another common Creationist misconception:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/thermo/creationism.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CF/CF001_3.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/thermo/probability.html

<<...all ought to have a healthy respect for God and the consequences of rebellion against him.>>

How can someone rebel against a being they don't believe exists? How could we have a healthy respect for a being, when we cannot be absolutely certain of the existence of it?

<<By analogy, I have a healthy fear of crossing the road.>>

At least you can prove that cars exist.

<<I don’t take it lightly, but I also don’t live in fear of cars.>>

Firstly, try not to hyper-focus on the word “fear”. The mere belief of such an imprudent eternal consequence is enough to support my point.

Secondly, I have never said that Christians “live in fear”. The rewards of Heaven also support my point.

<<That you are always referring back to certain fears seems to betray what is going on in your own psychology since departing the church.>>

Not at all.

Do I know for certain that there is no God? Of course not, no one can really know that for sure (Although the probability of the existence of God is near zero).

Do I believe there is a God who would so unjustly punish his creations, that he is supposed to love so much, with such an awful punishment? Absolutely not!

If there were such a God, then he would have less wisdom than his own creations, and that doesn't make sense.

Continued...

...Continued

Would you keep your own child alive to be subjected to an eternity of torment, simply because they rejected you and didn't love you? No.

<<As for religion stifling curiosity and creativity>>

I never said religion stifled creativity.

<<...name a branch of modern science, ... that wasn’t pioneered by a Bible believing Christian.>>

That's a very narrow way of looking at it. You're ignoring the fact that when Christianity took over in Europe, scientific and technological advancement almost totally came to a halt.

Not only are you ignoring the centuries before the 'Modern' era, but you're ignoring the discoveries that the study of Evolution has lead to. How is there any curiosity in explaining away the origins of life by stating: “God did it!”?

How about the stifling effect religion is having on stem cell research for starters?

There are many more examples of the stifling effect religion has on scientific curiosity. But to emphasise my point, I need only to mention Christian Right in America.

<<Modern science was born out of the Christian mind set of Western Europe.>>

Hardly.

It would be highly presumptuous to assume that because some of the pioneers of modern science were Christians, they're scientific pioneering was a result of their beliefs. Even if you could provide examples of this, they'd be minimal compared to the examples on the contrary.

Modern science was born 'despite' the Christian mindset, not 'because of' it.

<<You said theists have failed to accept basic logic provided on this thread. If you could provide an example of anything in this line...>>

Well, it's taking a long time to sink in that Evolutionists can't be compared with Creationists when your talking about scientific fundamentalism. It's been approached from many different angles but none of them have worked.

But what I also should have said, is that the length of this thread doesn't mean much if some have had to explain themselves over and over, and in many different ways, simply because words are being put into their mouths, meanings twisted or definitions of words, such as "evidence", are being trivialised.