Thanks runner.

Your joy and abounding love is manifest much as Christo-Stockholm Syndrome would suggest.

Did I mention fear? Today's lesson is "projection".

But seriously. Secularists hate nothing. Life is bursting with wonder and joy to the extent we have no need to hate. The bible teaches hate, and we are markedly busy cleaning up the fallout from this fiction.

More so. How can one hate what is not possible?

But Unicorns. Man - I do hate them. And tooth fairies, crop circle making aliens, homeopathy cures, acupuncture success stories... and much else that doesn't exist.

But god? It's a man made scam of petty annoyance, unworthy of emotional effort much less hate.

Firesnake
Yeah we see the loving hearts of secularist killing their unborn so they can continue their permissiveness lifestyles, preaching their failed pseudo science dogmas to ease their godless lifestyles and producing the most selfish generations in history. Dream on Firesnake along with Rusty in your make believe godless world. At least most are bright enough to know that the 'big bang' theory is as likely as you being the model of love you claim to be.

"Yeah we see the loving hearts of secularist killing their unborn so they can continue their permissiveness lifestyles, preaching their failed pseudo science dogmas to ease their godless lifestyles and producing the most selfish generations in history."

Blimey Runner... a bit on-the-nose isn't it? I don't see too much LURV in the CTFM crew, nor the evangelical fruitcakes Jim Wallace from the ACL mingles with.

And what about those Southern Baptists in Haiti, who have been looting-for-Jesus and stealing young children to 'save' and turn into Xtian robots?

They could be shot for looting in a disaster situation like this, and why not, eh?

Is see that the born-again-Xtain who shot the abortion doctor in America, to save-the-kiddies 'cos Jesus told me to', was found guilty in 40 minutes.

If I was a Haitian citizen, I might not take so long to find those Baptist child-looters guilty, and have them shot.

Funny thing, God's lurv... so easy to get it wrong, completely wrong, and do the most evil things in His name.

You clearly are devoted to sophistry, Mr Viljoen. And as slippery as that snake that pestered Adam and Eve, some five thousand years ago.

>>Therefore the debate should not be viewed as science versus faith. It’s more the science of one view versus the science of another.<<

Sounds plausible, at first listen.

>>Both the creation and the evolution views have their philosophical and religious implications.<<

Ye-e-e-e-e-es. But what has that to do with science?

>>From Wieland’s email correspondence, he certainly wanted to address the issue with regard to physical evidence... recent creation of groups of fully-formed organisms, global flood etc.<<

Ah, now I see your game. You want to have a religious/philosophical debate, based upon entirely different views of scientific evidence.

We are still not talking apples and apples, are we?

A debate on geological evidence should properly be conducted among geologists. Until and unless the evidence of a "young earth" is accepted by scientists, it has to be inadmissible in a debate between religion and atheism.

A "science of one" against the "science of the other" is a totally fair and reasonable proposition. But it can only work between scientists whose expertise lies in interpreting rocks and fossils and carbon dating and evolution and stuff.

Clever, Mr Viljoen.

But still merely sophistry, however well you wrap it in cleverness.

Pelican writes:

"Truth is in the eye of the beholder" and "It will always be up to individuals to make up their own minds."

Firstly, truth is not just an opinion, and whilst each of us is at liberty to 'think' 1 + 1 = 3, and even if the majority of us think 3 is the answer...you can see where this goes.

Now take something like murder (or the taking of a life) and we add another, moral, dimension to the liberty/thinking equation. And what about justice and how does love fit into all this?

I think the best way to describe the issue at hand is that a boxing match where the 2 protagonists are in separate boxing rings (faith, science) would be a bit inconclusive, and not all that entertaining.

Pericles,
You describe my writing as ‘clever’ and ‘beautiful’. I’ll take that as a compliment. I’m not sure how else I’m supposed to take it. If by sophistry you mean that I’m clever with words, well, I don’t know what other currency we’re supposed to deal with here at OLO.

Are we comparing apples with apples? Well, that’s the aim, at least from my perspective. I would hope that we can use the same measuring stick to compare and evaluate different views.

Science, as I understand it, entails applying reason to an observable and measurable body of evidence. A scientific debate should be decided by who can best logically explain the data. So let’s look at a rock. Let’s measure it and test it according to our theoretical models. Is it best explained by explanation A or explanation B?

The evidence (e.g. the rock) is the same in both cases. It is the explanation of the evidence that would be evaluated and judged. So if the best explanation is a ‘young earth’, why are you claiming that this is inadmissible? We should try to go beyond our philosophical preconceptions or counting votes. If you make only an ‘old earth’ evolutionary explanation admissible, is that not begging the question?

If, as you admit, evolution and creation have their philosophical implications, these need to be ignored, or taken into account, to the same measure. We cannot discount one on philosophical grounds and not the other. We’re aiming for a level playing field.

The difference between a creationist and evolutionist, or catastrophist and uniformitarian geologist, those who accept the young earth and those who don’t, is essentially not their level of training or expertise, but their explanation of the data. This is the very point in question.