David Rives, of David Rives Ministries, was a guest on a program called “Creation Today” just this past Friday, and he made the claim that The Big Bang Theory about the creation of the Universe is “bad science” because it contradicts The Bible. This is literally, of course, complete nonsense. You cannot presuppose that the Bible is 100% accurate simply because it declares itself to be, and then argue that anything that contradicts the Bible cannot possibly be accurate. There is no reason or sense to the claims of the Bible where the creation of the Universe is concerned. Take the stars. Rives, who claims to be an astronomer, also claims that all the stars we see in the Universe were created at once. And how does he know this? Because the Bible says so. It says they were all created on the fourth day. Therefore, any science that says otherwise is “bad science.” You’ve seen the pictures of the Eagle Nebula, the one that includes the famous Gaseous Pillars. Scientists (real ones) say that what you are seeing are new stars being formed. David Rives says that can’t be possible because it contradicts the Bible’s assertion that all the stars were created on one day. He says what you’re really seeing is clouds moving and revealing a star that was there all along. Go ahead, watch him say it.
Rives confront the question anyone would ask someone who claims the Earth is but six thousand years old, “How do you explain the stars being millions of light years away if the Universe is only six thousand years old?” Rives gives half an explanation for why this is. He claims that gravity affects time, therefore light moves at different speeds as it’s affected by the varying Force of Gravity throughout the Universe. Now, I would stop him right there and call “Bullshit!” And it’s not because his science is necessarily wrong or incomplete, since velocity also affects time for an object, but because he’s talking about Gravity, a concept that did not exist in the Bible. And you can’t study Astronomy if you don’t know anything about Gravity. But the Bible does not say anything about Gravity, so Gravity must be “bad science.”
You can’t make the claim that all of Science is wrong if it contradicts YOUR personal axioms. You can’t claim that no empirical proof of your axiom is possible because any result that contradicts the Bible must inherently be wrong. There are many places where the Bible contradicts itself, so it can’t possibly be taken as the unquestioned truth. Nor can any “logical proof” be derived from it that isn’t flawed because of its internal inconsistencies. Which means it cannot possibly be the truth. I wish they would learn that.
This is our daily open thread. Feel free to discuss Religion, Science, Religion v. Science, or anything else you wish to discuss.
TheZoo 
“It says they were all created on the fourth day”.
Time is relative.
Perhaps it was just a really really long day with lots of overtime and outsourced labor from China.
7 days are literal. 40 days and nights are metaphorical. People supposedly living several centuries is literal or metaphorical, depending on who you ask.
Here’s the simple of it: time in the Bible is literal except where it is metaphorical or allegorical. There is nothing to indicate which is which, so only those true believers who are direct communication with God can tell you which is which. In most cases, use whatever is most appealing to you,, or the one that makes your best case against anyone disparging the belief system.
Apparently God is all powerful, but he forgot to make all humans aware of his godhoodness from the day of tehir creation, and has chosen to not correct said error, even though by his own rules those who do not follow him will spend n eternity in ultimate suffering and torment, even just for the ‘crime’ of not believing, but don;t worry becasue God is Love and he loves you so much that he will allow you this opportunity becasue that is what love is all about… that and blind obedience. I need to tell Lady Cagey about htese ‘rules of love’: just obey me and do what i say and never question me, regardless of what emperical evidence you encounter. (I sense the proverbial… or literal.. frying pan upside the head in response…).
(I sense the proverbial… or literal.. frying pan upside the head in response…)
In my case it’s usually a rolling pin. 🙂
You know, we both are ALSO now in the doghouse for using gender-stereotyped implements (does it HAVE to be a frying pan or rolling pin?).
Can’t speak for you, cagey. but there’s a well-documented history here of me getting whopped upside the head with a rolling pin. Ask anyone here. 🙂
Oh, my.
For my part, I do most of the cooking (not that I’m good at it), so it is possible that Lady Cagey thinks they are implements of destruction (oohh.. that works as a reference to my cooking, too 🙂 Is that a double entendre of sorts?).
While it is not conducive to a pleasant computing experience, maybe consider some fashionable head gear — like a kinght’s helm.
Hey, I only threatened, I never even went to the kitchen to get it!
How about I whack you both with a hammer? 😉
It’s all literal except for the parts that aren’t. Which parts are which is a bit vague.
And the all-knowing God really got surprised by that Satan fellow. He didn’t see that coming, apparently. Or did he?
Oh, and as KISS will tell you, “On the 8th day, God created rock and roll.” (o.k., terrible song, but topical).
You’re right, God said: I wanna rock and roll all night and party every day.
“God Gave Rock and Roll to You” (yeah, don’t bother listening to that one either — but I do like KISS…).
Apparently that’s exactly what god did — 7 days of work, followed by aeons of chillin’ and partyin’ and a lot of “It ain’t my concern… didn’t I write some shit about ‘free will’ for y’all?”
and on the eight day, he created a new FAITH BASED boys group….
Christian-based scouting group launches after Boy Scouts allow gay youth
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/09/07/20363903-christian-based-scouting-group-launches-after-boy-scouts-allow-gay-youth?lite
Thier motto: “Hate the Gay every day.”
Right a ‘Christian’ – based scouting group….. and those churches that have decided they don’t ‘hate teh gay’ and have kept their cub packs and troops and are even now (in my case this is going on right now – we are talking to an orphaned pack to join ours at the Lutheran church and the local Catholic church stepped up to offer to take in another) setting out to welcome packs and troops that have been literally thrown out of their ‘churches’ and ‘Christian schools’.
It just seems to be the fookin Fundies again….’everyone who is just like me can be a Christian, but if you are not like me…. well you can fook off in Jesus name!’
I met with a group of parents from the so-called Christian School pack last Thursday and all they want is for their little lads to have a chance to be cubs and have fun with their friends and learn something about the 12 principles of scouting …. two of which are compassion and respect. I didn’t ask them what they told their 6-10 year old boys about why they might be able to be cubs anymore…
Bachmann: The Muslim Brotherhood did 9/11
(You should click the link just to see the still of The Three Stooges.)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/09/michele-bachmann-911_n_3893575.html
I thought Obama’s grandma was behind 9/11 as part of her plot to catapult him to the presidency and then to Master of All He Surveys by forcing Bush to do his bad stuff, and… and…. ummm.. “libtards did it”…. with the muslin brudderhood…
Another potential Pastafarian
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/09/09/nfl-player-arian-foster-will-teach-daughter-about-flying-spaghetti-monster-religion/
The downfall of the United States began when we outlawed slavery. God approved & Jesus Christ ratified slavery, going so far as to tell slaves to be obedient to their masters. By outlawing slavery we have gone against God’s Will and have heaped damnation upon ourselves. The only way to get back into His Good Graces is to legalize slavery once more. Eliminating the minimum wage & child labor laws would be a good start.
/snark
Slavery is in the bible. So you could be on to something.
Please, Please, don’t tell MalWart we’re gonna legalize slavery ! They’ll fire all their underpaid employees and replace them with cheaper labor.
Is that even possible?
slaves have to be housed, clothed and fed.
minimum wage is cheaper. especially when you factor in the cost of chains and overseers
and the continual cleanup in aisle 4…
And doesn’t the Buy-bull say that the moon is an independent light source? How does Thomas Aquinas there square that up? I have to suppress bursting out in laughter everytime I hear some one say “It says so in the Bible” as if that is the end of the discussion. Not enough people call out this bs when they hear it … because we need to give ‘respect to religious views’ – sorry I can’t respect people who can’t separate reality from mysticism – I laugh at them.
I had a chat with a ‘believer’ one time, a Mormon fellow, about science and origins, etc. He had, to my surprise, no argument with evolution, the age of the earth and universe, or the Big Bang. I finally said that the only question I had that still puzzled me was the origin of the singularity which allowed the Big Bang. He said, “Oh, God created it.” I asked, “Where did God come from?” He said, “God is eternal.” I asked why the extra step, why not just acknowledge that the physical laws, particles, energy, etc. that allowed the Big Bang are ‘eternal’, and save a totally unnecessary step.
Puzzled look, conversation over.
In re the Bible; it may possibly contain some historical details that would otherwise not be available; it may also contain a truth, or two or three. But other than that, it is nothing other than the writings of faded men, translated hundreds of times at least (liberally translated, I imagine); there is no validity beyond that, because it’s based on the mythological thesis that a nonexistent “God” had something to do with all of that which exists. The bible is, in that context, basically not worth a whole lot to anyone other than the occasional historian, and s/he should, indeed, also be VERY skeptical of that which is ‘written’ therein.
My belief is that what we think of as the Space-Time Continuum, within which our Universe exists, has always been there. It never began and it will never end. But the things inside, our Galaxy and our Solar System, are constantly undergoing changes. Stars explode and stars collapse. The Big Bang which created our Universe occurred inside an already-existing Universe. (This would logically explain how astronomers – real ones, not the ones like the idiot in the video – could find objects that appear to be older than the estimated age of the Universe.)
And this will go on forever and ever, just as it has gone on since long before our Universe came into existence.
Yep, the space/time continuum defines the extremely human-ameliorated concept called “eternity.” Eternity is tricky for the finite mind to contemplate or comperehend . . . unless a “God” (classically a frown-faced old white guy with grey hair and beard in a white robe, sitting on a cloud) is involved. After that it gets easy. Ask most any believer to explain something that diverges from known reality, and they’ll say “There are some things God doesn’t intend for us to know.” Ask a scientist in the appropriate discipline, he’ll say, “I don’t know, but call me tomorrow, or the next day.”
There’s reality, and there’s religion; seldom shall the twain e’er meet.
“Why the extra step?” – right, as soon as the *need* for God has rescinded and *he* is hiding behind a singularity at the beginning of the Universe, then all this mumbo-jumbo about either ‘guiding my life’ or providing a purpose is totally bollocks – *if* he exists, he is irrelevant – he can’t care or doesn’t care what we do so we should simply cut him loose, stop worrying about ‘what he wants’ and figure out how to get on with other. Right now he doesn’t want little boys to have fun with their friends and go camping and stuff…. seems like *he* is a bit of a prick or maybe its the dickheads who purport to know what *he* wants who are the pricks… hmm, I think I may have made my mind up on that one.
And don’t forget: it was God who created the “pricks.” the “dickheads,” “queers,” and even Republicans AND the Fascists (assuming there’s a difference). I gotta wonder: why did ‘he’ do that? Creating “goodness” is nice, creating “intelligence” is nice, but why evil? Why idiots? Why Boner, Trump, Bachmann, Palin, King, Gohmert, Cruz, Rubio, Stalin, Hitler, Rand Paul, Mao, . . . et al. et al. and to name just a few? Why?
Why? Ain’t no God out there, that’s why. Random chance, that’s why.
That “extra step” keeps them from losing all sense of right and wrong, and then killing us all with an ax. Let him keep his invisible sky fairy — for all our sake.
historically, the old testament is unique, in that it was written by the losers of so many conflicts.
Just try telling them the moon is reflecting sunlight, not generating its own light. Hilarity will ensue.
The Guardian had two great articles over the weekend which I caught up on getting back onling.
The US lack of credibility over Syria – a mainstream oultet’s opinion piece calling out directly what we at the Zoo have known since 2004 – the US used chemical weapons in Iraq. Starts with a brilliant Churchill quote (the first person to use chemical weapons in Iraq
Switching gears and here’s the news which is under the radar – a new tax code rule which will stiff waiters and waitresses and other staff depending on tips right in the family jewels – coming full circle to the fookin’ Fundies it contains the quote:
“when one woman in a large group she was serving left $0 tip and a note that said “I give God 10%. Why do you get 18?” “
I’m curious how this lady gives her 10% tithe to god? I was under the impression that she gives 10% of her income to “some people”, who call themselves “a church”, and then she tells herself that she has “tithed to god”.
Why does god need money?
IIRC the woman was a pastor of some sort, so she’s basically giving the 10% to herself.
Gawd wants her to have a new car and that cute Prada bag!
So,… if I get this right… this lady is saying, then, that God wants people to give her money? Specifically: 10% of what they earn. For no other reason than, “Because”?
But won’t leave a tip? Wow.
Because Jesus.
“Why does God need a starship?”
A most able summation of the bible, by Emily Dickinson:
OH NO! the rebels threaten to sack two christian towns!…
http://news.yahoo.com/rebels-threaten-storm-2-syrian-christian-towns-111223888.html
Sergei Lavrov also said that Syria has consolidated its chemical weapons into one or two locations to protect them from a rebel onslaught. Russia, which has military advisers training Syria’s armed forces, has kept close watch over Damascus’s chemical arsenal, Lavrov added.
I hope that when we start bombing, we don’t kill any Russian soldiers, too. That will just complicate things.
Well, that does it then. Time to support the rebels and not Assad . . . Oh, wait. Hmmm.
Why can’t all the Assad supporters and all the rebel supporters all go off into the desert and go about killing each other out there away from all the people just trying to live their damn lives? ….’course, that WOULD make the whole lot of ’em one nice big target….
God wouldn’t like that crap about “people just trying to live their own lives,” for whatever reason. And as we all know, God’s in charge. Right? Right.
Well, he’s in charge when you need to explain things you like, and he’s not in charge when you need to explain things you don’t like. And vice versa. It’s a remarkable system.
To explain things they don’t like, there is ‘Satan.’ I always ask that if God, who is rumored to be supreme, doesn’t like Satan, why the hell doesn’t he like hire Ted Nugent to shoot him, or whatever?
Standard answer: first a shrug, then, “there’s some things god doesn’t want us to know.”
Right. I’ve long wondered how it is that so many can be so captured by so little. Guess I’ll never know.
I tend to believe that Assad himself did not know about the use of chemical weapons nor did he order them used. I believe he has lost control of his forces. I also believe Assad is a twat, surrounded by fellow twats, and sought after by equally disgusting twats. Bomb or no bomb, Syria will be run by twats for a loong looong time to come.
It’s the end of civilization! You must send a letter to your employees! Oh the humanity!
They’re really grasping at ways to keep up the negative hype about the ACA.
Business Owners May Face $100-Per-Day Penalty Under ObamaCare | Fox Small Business Center
If I may, I *fart* in the general direction of Fox News. They’ll probably not notice, but still . . .
OMG! What a bucking furden! They have to write a letter! O, alas and alack, the ruination!
O.k. No, really. Tell me: It’s the 1960’s. I’m at Woodstock. I took the brown acid. Everything will go back to normal once it passes through my system.
Please. Make. The. Crazy. Right. Wingers. Stop.
George Zimmerman Taken Into Custody Over Incident Involving Gun
But Trayvon Martin was the “thug?”
Hell, he wasn’t even taken into custody after he murdered Trayvon. So what sort of infraction with a gun gets you in custody when murder doesn’t?
Things are out of whack.
So what sort of infraction with a gun gets you in custody when murder doesn’t?
Maybe because said infraction was against a white individual? Jes’ wonderin’. 🙂
Bingo!
I hope Shellie keeps in mind that all George has to do is claim he thought his life was in danger and he can legally shoot and kill her.
On account of it’s a fucked-up law they let ALEC write down there.
I think the members of ALEC who wrote the SYG laws should be charged with the murder of everyone “legally” killed under SYG laws. I know it will never happen, but it would satisfy my sense of Justice.
If I had a gun, say, and I went to an ALEC meeting, could I legally blow away all those assholes on the basis that they’re a ‘threat’ to me and to the country in which I live?
Yes, but sadly, that’d get you orange and chrome in a minute. Remember, you’re a lucking fiberal.
Well, ok, but say I was a really great shot and ALL of ALEC was there and I had an assault rifle with a really GIANT magazine!!!!
Whew. I get excited just thinking about it!
Second amendment and GOD put together guarantee me the right to nail every one of the bastards. No?
Gee. Zimmerman is an asshole. Who could have ever imagined? Sometimes there seems to be a good reason to repeal that double jeopardy stuff. Like NOW for example.
Or maybe that ‘stand your ground’ shit only applies when all’s you wanna kill is wimmin and/or ni**ers in hoodies?
How long will it take before the right-wingers start whining that: “Obama and Holder won’t rest until poor George is dead or in prison”? “And blacks shooting whites never, ever, get’s reported”!
She filed for divorce from the pig, and his daddy is pissdamnmad. Temper, temper Zimmermansss..
As if daddy has any say in the matter?
Maybe daddy’s pissed because half of all that fund-raising is going walk out the door.
That fundraising is already spent. Zimmer’s asking the state to pick up his legal tab.
As I understand it, under the SYG laws, all the members of both families and all their close friends on either side have a groundwork for arguing SYG in a lethal confrontation with anyone else from this group.
They have just legalized ‘feudin’.
That’s one way to weed out the stupid.
It was easy for Zimmerman to shoot and kill a person once. What’s to stop him from doing it again? He didn’t show any remorse with the first kill.
In Florida, apparently, absolutely nothing.
apparently it’s left Zimmer feeling like he can get away with murder.
Wonder if Vegas takes odds on who’s gonna off who, Zimmer or ex-Zimmer.
Raise taxes $1 to fund existing libraries? Kentucky Tea Partiers say that’s tyranny!
http://www.alternet.org/economy/tea-party-wages-war-public-libraries?paging=off
Books is COMMANIST and SCIENCE (sam ting!) shit! Cept fer the buybull of course.
Oh the irony – the very cornerstone of an informed citizenry….. defunded by those who soley among their fellows abrogate to themselves that they alone are informed.
A newly discovered cave. It even has its own river. They plan to open it to the public soon. Personally, I wouldn’t go near it. One of the reasons for my phobia bout deep water is not so irrational after all – there are things living below the surface of the water that would gladly eat you if given the chance. I could see this cave river being the basis for a new Really Bad SyFy Original Movie.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/07/son-doong_n_3873341.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
No, I am not insane (depends who you ask) and I would be all over that thing with a camera.
I saw a documentary where the explorers were mapping this cave. It was really an amazing discovery.
Joey quits!!!
Hey zxbe, and everyone else; check out these pics …
http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2013/05/2013-national-geographic-traveler-photo-contest/100516/
Beautiful stuff!
Those pictures were amazing. Thanks for sharing.
Rives is on The Thom Hartmann show right now.
Might channel that later…. sometimes fundy bashing is just fun to watch.
Meh. Thom is much too nice to them. He should have taken control the second that Rives conflated biology and cosmology. Also, for someone who calls himself a “science geek”, Thom just isn’t all that knowledgeable about the subject. It seemed to me that he let Rives get away with a Gish Gallop and then, rather than stopping him and disputing the PRATT, he just went with “why does God have more credibility than the FSM?”
“Unbelievably small”
That’s how Kerry described the proposed military strikes against Syria. Does Kerry have any handlers that can muzzle him or provide some kind of 7-second delay when he talks so someone can lunge for the mute button?
It’s hard to convince people that only a minimal effort is required at the same time you’re trying to convince them that this is so very critical.
Rudepundit skewered Kerry is a typically very rude post full of NSFW imagery But his point is… er …made.
“I’m sorry, we can’t murder you today. The attorney general responsible for your cold-blooded, psychopathic murder by the state is going to be fundraising, and she wants to be sure to be here to watch you be brutally murdered. She gets off on it, you see, and we can’t deny her her orgasm.”
Mild surprise: It’s not Texas
http://www.wtxl.com/news/local/fla-ag-fundraiser-led-to-execution-date-change/article_bf113c08-1974-11e3-bb6b-0019bb30f31a.html
If I were his attorney, I’d be all over that as “cruel and unusual punishment.” Try to find a RW judge who’ll say the Constitution puts campaign fundraising above all else. This person has to come to terms with being executed (and I do not speak to the depravity of the crime which garnered him this sentence), and then has to be told it will be rescheduled because the damn Attorney General can’t make it that day because she has to go out and raise money to get re-elected?
I guess she doesn’t want the votes of the victim’s family members.
Or what Wayne already said. 😉
The death penalty is bad enough, but this is cruel and unusual punishment.
Ah, here’s a possible answer for the above story.
George Zimmerman’s wife calls 911, says husband ‘had a hand on his gun’
But since she nor her father would press charges, Georgie will get another chance to stand his ground.
Here in the relatively sane state of Minnesota they arrest the party in a domestic fight who has a gun. We also don’t grant handgun permits to those who have ever had a restraining order against them or assaulted a police officer. Furthermore, if a person calls 911 and says “he’s got a gun” the person accused of having the gun is taken into custody until it is established that the accused does not have a gun. In all cases, once a claim of domestic violence has been made, the police are required to make an arrest and the person is summarily charged though it’s up too the court’s discretion if said charges should be dropped if the victim refuses to pursue charges.
In Florida? It makes me sick. At this point about the best we can hope for is that Zimmerman will have a sudden attack of conscience and shoot himself before he kills again.
Flori-duh.
“George Zimmerman’s wife calls 911, says husband ‘had a hand on his gun’ ”
Jeebus, now it’s a crime to grab yer own crotch?
Is that a Derringer in your pants, or are you just a cold blooded murderer?
I don’t usually resort to penis jokes but when I do, I prefer short and flaccid ones.
😆
And then she refused to press charges…
Did she really say “I don’t know what he’s capable of”? He’s capable of KILLING PEOPLE! I wonder whether she declined to press charges because she’s afraid of George, afraid of his father, is a bloody moron, or all of the above.
“[The police are] telling his body guard to get out of the way” (about 1:50 mark) . F#cker showed up with his body guard!
Now it makes sense (Spit!).
“We have no victim, no crime,” said Police Chief Steve Bracknell.
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/09/09/2594431/zimmerman-domestic-violence-law/
US Senate delays Syria strike vote over Russian ‘chemical handover’ proposal
This could end up a feather in Obama’s cap. Rattle a sabre, and the Russians fall all over themselves to avoid their boy in Syria getting tipped over. Obama gets rid of the CW, without firing a shot.
Hmmm, not sure if this is a good thing. Other than Obama being able to save face in this situation.
Somebody stuff a towel in Kerry’s mouth, huh?
Kerry was a bad choice for Secretary of State. I heard him speak when he was campaigning for the presidency. He was boring then and he is boring now. Bill Richardson should have been offered this position as he has a way of connecting to people.
My take on all of these latest positions is this; I have been paying attention for 50 years on American foreign policy, and a Sec. of State never says anything without prior approval from his/her boss. Kerry is NOT sticking his foot-in-mouth as a loose cannon, it’s planned, and approved. Harry Reid has delayed the Senate vote on giving the Prez the authorization. You think he did that without consultation with the Prez? This is a chess game of great importance; Assad and Putin have blinked. Your move Mr. President. Btw Michelle is against using a military strike.
The stupid trolls are already saying that Putin is showing Obama how it’s done. I’m not sure of the source but they all seem to be using the exact same phrase so it must have come from someone.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Apparently these three girls, home “schooled” of course, think that Harry Potter and Buffy the Vampire Slayer are real. So? They perform exorcisms.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23986595
“We think it’s OK to train teenagers to get drunk and have sex, but to do moral things for God, oh let’s not train them to do that,” says Larson.
Yes, that’s right. Do NOT train them to do moral things for God. I’m not sure I know everything that your God considers moral.
Slavery. Incest. Cutting off your enemy’s foreskins.
Ain’t technology cool?
Awesome.
http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/breaking-hawaii-governor-schedules-special-session-for-same-sex-marriage-vote/politics/2013/09/09/74760
For more on the Zimmerman case…
If she felt threatened, she should have stood her ground and killed him.
Oh, the sweet ironic justice that would have been.
George Zimmerman's Wife on 911 Tape: 'I Am Really, Really Scared' – Yahoo! News
Savannah Guthrie? NBC let Savannah Guthrie interview Obama? YHGTBFKM!
I know, I know, if it’s under the NBC name, it’s gotta be one of their own. It could have been worse. It could have been Chuck Todd or, gasp, Luke Russert.