Evidence Bible: Irrefutable Evidence for the Thinking Mind is an evangelical Christian book
authored by Ray Comfort and endorsed by Josh McDowell and Franklin
Graham.
As if the stink of Ray
Comfort's creationist manure spewed from his rectal cavity that
passes for his mouth wasn't bad enough, now two professional
repulsive Christian liars have placed Comfort's organic fertilizer on
a pedestal to make the smell stand out more.
Perhaps that is why I have
seen this very book in possession of many street preachers, amongst
their stashes of gospel tracts and tiny Bibles. Surprisingly, some of
the street preachers I have talked to say they are unaware of who Ray
Comfort is, though I don't think they are being completely honest.
Perhaps it was just because this is a big thick book endorsed by
McDowell and Graham that got their attention, without knowing much at
all about the infamous “Banana-man” dumb ass. Hard to tell what
the reason is, especially given that I don't trust a word from a
street preacher – especially the ones who are promoting as
embarrassingly ridiculous as creationism.
The Evidence Bible is basically the
books from the New Testament, in addition to Psalms and Proverbs from
the Old Testament. Key difference, each chapter includes footnotes,
annotations, and sections addressing certain questions, points, or
objections from non-Christians. Essentially, Ray Comfort turned his
beloved book of fables into a creationist manual, hoping to make the
exchange of lies from creationist cheep to others more efficient.
Virtually, every single piece Ray
Comfort has included in this book is his same old long-debunked
mantras, with a couple inclusions from anti-science propaganda
sources. Throughout this book, Ray tries (and fails) to show 1) the
Biblical scientific foreknowledge in the Bible and 2) a case against
evolution, skepticism, atheism, and non-Christian views. Of course,
his use of logical fallacies in this book are too many to count.
For this review, I will bother very
little with the Bible stories (other people have done a fine job at
that) and focus on the footnotes, annotations and Q&A's implanted
by Ray.
Questions and Answers
Who made God?
On page 82 in another Question and Answer bit, they ask the question: "Who made god?" And they answer with: “To one who examines the evidence, there can be no doubt that god exists. Every building has a builder. Everything made has a maker. The fact of the existence of the creator is axiomatic (self-evident). That's why the bible says, 'The fool has said in his heart there is no god' (Psalm 14:1). The professing atheist denies the common sense given to him by god, and defends his belief by thinking that the question 'who made god?' can't be answered. This, he thinks, gives him license to deny the existence of god.”
There is no
“evidence” to examine that can prove the existence of a god.
Equating man-made
structures to nature is a false equivalence fallacy. There is no
indication or reason to make that connection. Nature is capable of
producing structures that look designed, but they are merely the
results of natural physical laws and forces. For instance, has anyone
ever seen “a bridge without a bridge maker?” Absolutely.
- Likewise, we have seen traps form on their own. Ever heard of the Venus Fly trap? It is a plant that traps flies, and we know how it evolved naturally without a creator.
- How about a motor that was made without a motor engineer? Absolutely, behold the bacterial flagellum. Despite this being the flag-ship of ID creationists, this biological motor has been shown to be reducible. The Matzke Model explains and demonstrates the steps to how the flagellum naturally evolved without a designer.
- How about artworks of lines and patterns. Take a look at these designs in sand dunes.
Have we ever seen a sculpture form
without a sculpture?????
-
Look at the rock formation in Maui's Iao Valley State Park that bears a striking resemblance to President John F. Kennedy in profile.
- The eroded mountain on Mars that under coarse-grained resolution looks like a face.
- Or the eagle rock off the 134 freeway in Southern California that overlooks the town Eaglerock.
Have we seen other human-like faces
pop up naturally in nature? Sure, Christians love to cheer every time
they see Jesus' face appear of grilled cheese sandwiches. Same thing
with Mother Teresa or the Virgin Mary.
Overall, ALL of
these things occur naturally without invoking an intelligent
designer. Since the human brain is hard-wired to detect patterns, we
base nature as designed based on our experience of human artifacts.
We see patterns in clouds, crystals, and snowflakes, but we already
know that they all manifest naturally without a designer. We can test
and prove that snowflakes, while having many geometrical patterns,
form naturally in the clouds under certain conditions. We also know
that evolution of living organisms can develop characteristics that
give the illusion of design. The point is, all these things were made
naturally without a designer. Comfort presupposes that everything
around him is designed, particularly life. The
issue here is that there Comfort does not distinguished between
naturally made objects versus artificially made objects, rather he
seems to insert they are all the same thing.
This is why he compares man-made buildings with naturally living
things that does not need a designer. This is going way beyond
comparing apples and oranges (or perhaps bananas).
Furthermore, Ray
Comfort provides no evidence that the universe was “made” to
therefore require a “maker.” The universe, like the examples
given, is the result of a natural formation without the assistance of
a “maker” or “creator.” Many people call the universe
“reality” because it contains everything real, but does that mean
that there is a realtor? Of course not, that is ridiculous.
The only thing
Ray Comfort asserts as his proof is that it is somehow “axiomatic.”
No sorry, it is not axiomatic. No matter how much Ray Comfort asserts
it, merely claiming something is axiomatic is not good enough. Many
humans once thought it was axiomatic that the sun revolves around the
Earth. One can claim an invisible undetectable and omnipotent fairy
created the galaxy is axiomatic.
Ray only relies
on his word games by merely labeling the universe as “creation”
without any proof to back up his claims. He has claimed his proof is
just mere “common sense” but science relies on evidence, not
intuition. Science in fact has shown that the universe is perfectly
capable of forming on it's own without the need to invoke a magical
being. Ergo, the theistic claim that a god is axiomatic is false.
On top of that,
claiming those who disagree with your unproven and indefensible
presuppositions of “God-did-it” as “fools” is completely
backwards. It's the old playground
game of “I am rubber you are glue, whatever bounces off of me
sticks to you.” Its an infantile tactic that is described as the
pot calling the silverware black. Its a sort of psychological spin.
How else can you defend an indefensible position? You have to twist
everything around. That is why the Bible defines the fool as someone
who does not believe completely the outrageous claims from the most
incredulous sources even without asking for evidence – despite the
fact that every other source in the world defines a fool as someone
who does all of these things.
In sum, Ray
Comfort is not only the one here lacking common sense, the worse part
is is that he is doing so deliberately to lie to his readers. For
years, he has heard ever reasonable response to him through the
Internet, public, and even on television. And in every single case,
Ray Comfort abandons his honesty and common sense, repeats the
long-debunked mantra's as just examined, and in the end profits on
the confusion he bestows onto others.
“The question of who made god can be answered by simply looking at space and asking, 'Does space have an end?' Obviously it doesn't. If there is a brick wall with 'The end' written on it, the question arises, 'What is behind the brick wall?' Strain the mind though it may, we have to believe (have faith) that space has no beginning and no end. The same applies with god. He has no beginning and no end. He is eternal.”
“The bible also informs us that time is a dimension that god created, into which man was subjected. It even tells us that one day time will no longer exist. That will be called 'eternity.' God himself dwells outside of the dimension he created (2 Timothy 1:9, Titus 1:2). He dwells in eternity and is not subject to time. God spoke history before it came into being. He can move through time as a man flips through a history book. Because we live in the dimension of time, logic and reason demand that everything must have a beginning and an end. We can understand the concept of god's eternal nature the same way we understand the concept of space having no beginning and no end – by faith. We simply have to believe they are so, even though such thoughts put a strain on our distinctly insufficient cerebrum.”
Equating these attributes to God
(timeless, transcendent, etc) is just as valid and credible as giving
these traits to galactic sky pixies or Lord Krishna, among hundreds
of other supernatural entities. This is meaningless and pointless,
because we must be able to verify said beings exist in the first
place. It is as pointless as a Big Foot hunter claiming Big Foot must
be “highly intelligent and capable of speech” without even
providing proof that Big Foot exists in the first place. Do you see
the problem?
And it gets worse! Read what Ray
Comfort JUST SAID: “We
can understand the concept of god's eternal nature ... by faith. We
simply have to believe they are so”
So here we have it. Ray admits only by
faith (i.e. belief without a shred of evidence) does he holds
that one specific entity with these traits (timeless and
transcendent) is his narrow version of God of Abraham. By this fact
alone, Ray Comfort cannot prove God, because he admits that he only
believes it on faith, thereby making the whole 'God-debate'
pointless.
If this debate was whether a person
believed on faith that a invisible dragon slept in their backyard, we
would not bother – and rightly so. There is no evidence for said
dragon, the claims about the dragon are illogical and indefensible.
So why are we bothering to address this “God” that only Ray
Comfort believes by faith? Normally such a lunatic would be left
alone, if it wasn't for the fact said lunatic was trying to poison
the minds of others (especially school children) with lies and
selling snake oil for profit.
Ultimately, Ray Comfort and Kirk
Cameron did not fully answer the question "who created God?"
Space and God are not fully the same thing. According to the Big Bang
Theory, time and space appeared simultaneously in the universe. If
time didn't exist before this then what does "God created space
and time" mean? He simply wouldn't be able to.
And finally, Ray shot himself in the
foot by relying on the words within two books in the Bible that are
dishonest in of themselves. Why is this? Critical biblical and
historical scholars agree that the books 2 Timothy and Titus were not
written by Paul, but rather by forgers.
Abortion
On page 117, they talk about what god supposedly has to say about abortion, and how "taking the life of the unborn is clearly murder." Their ultimate point says that, “god's word says that he personally made each one of us, and has a plan for each life: 'Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart.' (Jeremiah 1:5)”
Let's think about that for a moment.
For the sake of argument, let's follow
the Christian logic. If God knew us and has a plan, then by extension
it is only reasonable to conclude that he knew and planned every
abortion and miscarriage.
Furthermore, how can God be against
abortion when he himself commanded mass abortions. That contradicts
what Ray claimed. NOWHERE in Jeremiah 1:5 does it say anything along
the lines of “hey, I'm God and I knew you all before you were born,
so please don't kill unborn children.” No, rather what we get, in a
dozen or so direct examples from the Bible, is God HIMSELF demanding
mass abortions. In Hosea 13:16: "The people of Samaria must bear
their guilt, because they have rebelled against their god. They will
fall by the sword; their little ones will be dashed to the ground,
their pregnant women ripped open."
So here we have God saying what he
wants, and then we have Ray Comfort speaking for God and claiming
what God wants. Who would you believe? Would you believe your own
mother who said herself that she wants X, or some stranger claiming
that your mother claimed she does not like X?
Furthermore proof that the God of
Abraham endorsed abortions, read Numbers 5. Numbers 5:16-27 basically
prescribe the application a primitive, unreliable abortionist.
Basically, if a husband thinks his pregnant wife was unfaithful, he
drags her to the priest, who mixes up a potion that is essentially
filth and water enchanted by pyrotechnic display and a prayer for
gods assistance. YES, GOD'S ASSISTANCE. If her belly bloats and her
womb discharges, meaning that she miscarries, then she is guilt of
infidelity. If not, she was faithful all along, but still does not
get an apology for her domineering addictive husband. The point is,
because the priest blessed with brew, God was directly involved
whether the unborn child would live or not. God decides whether to
slaughter them or allow them to live.
It is also important to note here that
Hebrew tradition, according to the Talmud, the fetus is only water
for the first 45 days, after that and until birth, it is regarded as
one of its mother's thighs. According to Genesis 30, thigh also
refers to the groin area.
Contradictions in the Resurrection Account
On page 259 it asks: "There are contradictions in the resurrection accounts. Did christ appear first to the women or to his disciples?” Their answer: “Both Matthew and Mark list women as the first to see the resurrected christ. Mark says, 'He appeared first to Mary Magdalene" (16:9). But Paul lists Peter (Cephas) as the first one to see christ after his resurrection (1 Corr. 15:5). Jesus appeared first to Mary Magdalene, then to the other women, and then to Peter. Paul was not giving a complete list, but only the important one for his purpose. Since only men's testimony was considered legal or official in the first century, it is understandable that the apostle would not list the women as witnesses in his defense of the resurrection here.”
Or Paul did not know about Mary, or
perhaps flat out believes that Jesus never appeared to a woman first.
The claim that women were not
considered important, reliable sources back then is completely false. This is proven by historians, such as Richard Carrier. You can read his work "Did No One Trust Women?"
Religious wars
On page 324 they ask: “Religion has caused more wars then anything else in history." They reply with stating that there have many people who have used religion for political gain. They say that, in John 16:2-3 that there will be some who, in their error, commit atrocities and murder in the name of god. However, they say, that these people are not true believers, and will be dealt with on judgment day.”
This is a fallacy known as the No True
Scotsman fallacy.
Seeing is Believing?
Page 444 they try to answer another skeptics question: "Seeing is believing. If I can't see it, I don't believe it exists." They answer: “We believe in many things that we can't see. Ask a skeptic if he has ever seen the wind. Has he seen history? Has he ever seen his brain? We see the effects of the wind, but the wind is invisible. We have records of history, but it is by 'faith' that we believe certain historical events happened. Television waves are invisible, but an antenna and a receiver can detect their presence. The unregenerate man likewise has a 'receiver.' However, the receiver (his spirit) is dead because of sin (Ephesians 2:1). He needs to be plugged into the life of god; then he will come alive and be aware of the invisible spiritual realm.”
Every religion claims to believe as
they do because of reason, education, or intelligence given by their
god in revelation. But whether they admit it or not, all of them are
assuming their preferred conclusions on faith, and this would still
be true even if all of their gods exist. Believe as hard as you want
to. But convincing yourself however firmly still can’t change the
reality of things. Seeing is believing. But seeing isn’t knowing.
Believing isn’t knowing. Subjective convictions are meaningless in
science, and eyewitness testimony is the least reliable form of
evidence.
For example, if I go into my front yard
and I see a large sauropod walking down the middle of my street, I
will of course be quite convinced of what I see. I may be even more
satisfied when I follow the thing and find that I can touch it, maybe
even ride it if I want to. When I gather sense enough to run back for
my camcorder, I may not be able to find the beast again, because I
don't know which way it went. But that doesn’t matter because I saw
it, I heard it, felt it, smelt it and I remember all that clearly
with a sober and rational mind. But somehow I'm the only one who ever
noticed it, and of course no one believes me. Some other guy says he
saw a dinosaur too, but his description was completely different,
such that we can’t both be talking about the same thing. So it
doesn't matter how convinced I am that it really happened. It might
not have. When days go by and there are still no tracks, no
excrement, no destruction, no sign of the beast at all, no other
witnesses who’s testimony lends credence to mine, and no
explanation for how a 20-meter long dinosaur could just disappear in
the suburbs of a major metropolis, much less how it could have
appeared there in the first place, -then it becomes much easier to
explain how there could be only two witnesses who can’t agree on
what they think they saw, than it is to explain all the
impossibilities against that dinosaur ever really being there.
Positive claims require positive evidence. Extraordinary claims
require extraordinary evidence, and that’s what I’d need –since
what I propose isn’t just extraordinary; its impossible. But since
there's not one fact I can show that anyone can measure or otherwise
confirm, then my perspective is still subjective -and thus uncertain.
Eventually, even I, the eyewitness, would have to admit that,
although I did see it, I still don’t know if it was ever really
there –regardless whether I still believe that it was.
It doesn’t matter how convinced you
are; belief does not equal knowledge. The difference is that
knowledge can always be tested for accuracy where mere beliefs often
can not be. No matter how positively you think you know it, if you
can’t show it, then you don’t know it, and you shouldn’t say
that you do. Nor would you if you really cared about the truth.
Knowledge is demonstrable, measurable. But faith is often a matter of
pretending to know what you know you really don't know, and that no
one even can know, and which you merely believe -often for no good
reason at all.
Circular Reasoning
On page 492 they pose as the skeptic and ask: "Christians can't use 'circular reasoning' by trying to prove the bible by quoting from the bible!" Their response: “The 'circular reasoning' argument is absurd. That's like saying you can't prove that the president lives in the white house by looking into the white house. It is looking into the white house that will provide the necessary proof. The fulfilled prophecies, the amazing consistency, and the many scientific statements of the bible prove it to be the word of god. They provide evidence that it is supernatural in origin.”
Their white house analogy is absurd.
Comparing the Bible to a building with a resident is fallacious. We
can verify that the building exists and a leader of a country dwells
in it, but when compared to a holy book, there is no external
evidence to verify that its contents are true. There is no evidence
for miraculous events like the dead rising from their graves after
Jesus' death (as recorded in Matthew).
Church Persecution of Galileo
On page 679 they ask the following: "Didn't the church persecute Galileo?" They argue the christian church therefore should not be blamed for his imprisonment. It was the Roman Catholic church that persecuted Galileo.
This is a True Scotsman Fallacy. Roman
Catholics are Christians. A Christian is someone who accepts there is
a God, Jesus is the key to salvation, and the Bible is God's Word. So
yes, Christians can be blamed for the persecution of Galileo. The
Catholics used the same Bible Ray Comfort uses, and focus entirely on
what Ray and millions of Christians today willingly ignore: the Bible
contains stories of a stationary geocentric Earth. Galileo's
discoveries were in conflict with the teachings of the Bible, so the
church choose to continue to believe in faith while trying to silence
all heresy. Some Christians try to do the same today with the theory
of evolution.
What does this say about being a
Christian? Some Christians deny Galileo's correct model of
heliocentrism, because the Bible says otherwise. Some Christians deny
the fact of evolution because it does not fit their views on what the
Bible says. Some Christians even deny the existence of planets,
because of their interpretations of the Bible.
What does this say about the faith of
Christianity, when often times the beliefs demand and dictate that
you must deny reality in favor of indefensible and inaccurate fables
in a old book?
Joy in Heaven?
On page 808 they pose a skeptic's question and try to answer it: "How can people be happy in heaven, knowing that their unsaved loved ones are suffering in hell?" They respond: “Those who ask such questions fall into the category of those who asked jesus a similar question. The Sadducees said that a certain woman had seven consecutive husbands, so whose wife will she be in heaven (Mark 12:23)?" Jesus answered by saying that they neither knew the scriptures nor the power of god. The unregenerate mind has no concept of god's mind or his infinite power. If god can speak the sun into existence; if he can see every thought of every human heart at the same time; if he can create the human eye with it's 137,000,000 light sensitive cells, then he can handle the minor details of our eternal salvation. John writes that in heaven 'we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is'(1 John 3:2), so perhaps we will be fully satisfied that god is perfectly just and merciful, and that he gave every individual the opportunity to accept or reject him. However he works it out, god promises that there will not be sorrow or crying in heaven. Our focus in heaven won't be our own loss, but our own gain.”
Here they are merely speculating about
what their unproven god might do, and how heaven might be, though
where is their evidence? Even they are unsure, because they are using
their own "language of speculation," with using the word
"perhaps." But regardless of what the clearly fallible
Bible claims, Ray and Kirk's seemingly uncaring attitude is
disturbing, saying that no one should care about their loved ones
while they are burning for eternity. Claiming that those in heaven
should just think about themselves, and no one else in hell, is just
horrible and selfish.
Spending eternity trapped in a world of
a Bible-god would be a lot like being trapped in the little home of
little Anthony Fremont, the creepy kid from the Twilight Zone. If you
have never seen that show, there was a little boy who had the powers
of God. If he didn't like something you said or THOUGHT (remember,
Ray Comfort says god can “see ever thought of every human heart”),
he would either turn you into macabre monstrosity, kill you in some
unthinkable fashion, sentence you to a living nightmare that never
ends, or banish you to the corn field (an implicitly oblivious place
which was never adequately described in the story. If he just showed
you a ghastly curse he just put on the cat or your spouse, you would
have to show him approval no matter how sick or twisted it was. You
had to smile wide and praise him for doing that awful thing, “that's
a good thing you did Anthony, a real good thing.” Because if you
didn't, if you did not make yourself think nice things about him, he
would tighten his lips, widen his eyes and all you could do was hope
he kill you quickly. So whenever Christians talk about Heaven, that
is almost exactly what they are selling. Think about enduring that
forever.
Arguments Against Science
On page 130 it says: "At least six different radiometric dating methods are available. The assumed age of the sample will dictate which dating is used because each will give a different result."
There is no “assumptions.” They are
dated by different measuring methods. Measurements of atomic decay
are generally considered one of the most accurate ways of measuring
the age of an object, and these measurements form the basis for the
scientifically accepted age of the earth. There are many different
variations of the radiometric dating technique such as radiocarbon,
argon-argon, iodine-xenon, lanthanum-barium, lead-lead,
lutetium-hafnium, neon-neon, potassium-argon, rhenium-osmium,
rubidium-strontium, samarium-neodymium, uranium-lead,
uranium-lead-helium, uranium-thorium, uranium-uranium, and fission
track, of which every single one will date objects far older than
10,000 years. Fission track dating is a radiometric dating technique
that can be used to determine the age of crystalline materials that
contain uranium. As uranium decays, it sends out atomic fragments,
which leave scars or "fission tracks" in crystalline
structures. Because decaying uranium emits fragments at a constant
rate, the number of fission tracks correlates to the age of the
object. This method is generally held to be accurate, as it shows a
high degree of concordance with other methods such as potassium-argon
dating.
Arguments Against Evolution
On page 80 Ray tries to disprove macro-evolution. They say, "While we do see what we call microevolution- variations within species (different types of dogs for instance)- we don't see any evidence of macroevolution- one species evolving into another species. Microevolution is observable, while macroevolution takes a tremendous leap of faith."
This is another blatant lie.
Macroevolution does not take any faith at all. There are massive
amounts of evidence for macroevolution (see
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/), not to mention that
speciation and macroevolution have been directly observed,
repeatably tested and proven both in the lab and in controlled
environments. Macroevolution has been proven beyond a shadow of a
doubt.
On page 92 they talk about why the peppered moth experiments did not prove evolution. The nocturnal peppered moth does not rest of the trunks of trees during the day. In fact, despite over 40 years of intense field study, only two peppered moths have ever been seen naturally resting on tree trunks! So where did all the evolution textbook pictures of peppered moths on different colored trees come from? They were all staged. The moths were glued, pinned, or placed onto tree trunks and their pictures taken. The scientists who used these pictures in their books to prove evolution all conveniently forgot to tell their readers this fact. If the best example of evolution is not true, how about all their other supposed examples? It makes you wonder doesn't it?" (Mark Varney)
The comment that moths do not rest on
trees that is false: Peppered moths do not rest exclusively on tree
trunks, but they do rest there. Of the forty-seven moths one
researcher found in the wild, twelve were on trunks and twenty were
on trunk/branch joints. (The other fifteen were on branches). The
numbers and proportion on trunks near light traps were even higher
(Majerus 1998, 123). Photos showing moths on trunks were staged but
only for purposes of illustration. The photographs depict what is
found in the wild, whether trunk or branch. Furthermore, the photos
played no part in the scientific research or its conclusions.
"However, this clearest case of purported Darwinian evolution by natural selection is not true. The nocturnal peppered moth does not rest on the trunks of trees during the day. In fact, despite over 40 years on intense field research, only two peppered moths have been seen naturally resting on tree trunks."
It didn't take me long to track down the source of this particular piece of disinformation. It comes from a review by evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne, in the respected scientific journal Nature, of a book on the evolution of insect pigments by Michael Majerus and a subsequent inacurrate and sloppy newspaper article in the Telegraph.
Coyne was echoing Sargeant and colleagues in questioning various field experiments conducted by Bernard Kettlewell in the 1970s regarding the predation of light and dark moths really showed that birds were responsible or whether other mechanisms were at work, hence the emphasis on the resting sites of the moths.
In any case, Coyne was also mistaken when he stated that only 2 moths had ever been found on trees, because in the very book he was reviewing Majerus himself states that he had personally found 47 such specimens. While this shows that the scientists are human and make mistakes, why is it the Creationists responsible for these lies didn't read the actual book in the question to find this out, or even maybe this excellent peer-reviewed scientific review on the subject? Perhaps it was because they weren't interested in the truth, but rather in spreading their slander to impugn evolutionary theory because it contradicts their own primitive creation myths.
So, in the end, the things that were NOT in question were the FACTS that the Moth color did change with the onset of the British industrialization and was reversed with the implementation of the clean air act; that this color change was due to a redistribution of the allelic frequency of the dominant gene responsible for the dark color; and that exactly the same phenomenon was observed in the United States. As such, the Peppered Moth is a perfect example of the FACT that evolutionary occurs. The only thing being debated is the exact mechanism of HOW it was occurring in this specific instance.
This is, in fact, a perfect example of healthy and honest intellectual debate and how science is willing to question existing knowledge, reassess the status quo and make changes in the light of new data. This is what allows it to continually improve and advance as each new development is incorporated into the body of knowledge while the unbending dogmatic mindset of the creationist is satisfied with explaining nothing by explaining everything with their god.
"They were all
staged. The moths were glued, pinned, or placed onto tree trunks and
their pictures taken. The scientists who used these pictures in their
books to prove evolution all conveniently forgot to tell their
readers this fact."
While creationists may have nothing better to do with their time than site in a ostentatious barn and mumble archaic incantations at the ceiling, scientists and wildlife photographers have more useful things to with their than sitting in a wood while twiddling their thumbs and waiting for the moths to settle onto a branches. Such staging is standard practice for this reason and these illustrations are just that -- illustrations to demonstrate points and not scientific documentation of natural phenomena. Creationist who feel that this should have been pointed out to the readers also presumably feel that Fox News should also nightly remind their viewers that the repulsive liar on their TV is not actually Glen Beck but a two-dimensional representation on a grid of phosphors, plasmas or diodes on their screens.
To suggest that these photographs were in any way deceptive is to be either completely ignorant of the point, incredibly mentally challenged or brazenly deceptive. In Ray and Kirk's case, it may even be all three.
"If the best example of evolution is not true, how
about all their other supposed examples? It makes you wonder doesn't
it?"
AHA -- there it is! The Achilles Heel Fallacy. Creationist's are nothing if not predictable. Even if by some miracle these sneaky weasels were right, this would in no way discredit the remaining mountain of evidence upon which the theory of evolution is built.
This is simplistic and dirty little smear that any politician would be proud of, and it you fall for it you're merely submitting yourself to being led by the nose by these filthy liars.
On page 210, they repeat the same old argument the blood clotting system is irreducibly complex proposed by Michael Behe: "To form a blood clot there must be twelve specific individual chemical reactions in our blood. If evolution is true, and if this 12-step process didn't happen in the first generation (i.e. if any one of these specific reactions failed to operate in their exact reaction and order), no creatures would have survived. They would all have bled to death!"
The blood clotting system has been
shown to be reducible. (see
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB200_2.html
In primitive Precambrian organisms, the
presence of only fibrinogen, prothrombin, tissue factor, and
plasminogen worked well for an extrinsic activation-only system in
organisms with a primitive vascular system and low “blood
pressure.” Over 400 million years the major advance was to
fine-tune the extrinsic activation system using two related serine
proteases. Since that time, as the vascular system improved and blood
pressure increased, there was a fine-tuning of the intrinsic
activating system. These steps make the progressive addition by
natural selection of multiple steps in the cascade easy to
understand. This is hardly the picture of an irreducibly complex
system that requires a divine creator to bring into existence all at
once.
On page 485, they discuss their classic arguments about Piltdown Man, Nebraska Man, Java Man, Heidelberg Man, and Neanderthal Man, trying to convince people that this is some of the only evidence that evolution has ever come up with, or that some of these are not valid finds, as far as fossils are concerned, but there are some big problems with their claims.
See the following;
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/a_nebraska.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/mauer.html
One hoax cannot indicate the
inferiority of conventional archeology, because creationists have
several of their own, including Paluxy footprints, the Calaveras
skull, Moab and Malachite Man, and others. More telling is how people
deal with these hoaxes. When Piltdown was exposed, it stopped being
used as evidence. The creationist hoaxes, however, can still be found
cited as if they were real. Piltdown has been over and done with for
decades, but the dishonesty of creationist hoaxes continues.
On page 486 in the inset titled 'Missing Link Still Missing' they claim that Archaeoraptor was a fake.
The missing link is not missing (and it
has not been for a very long time) and Archaeoraptor was not ever
published in any scientific journals. Only a handful of scientists
ever saw Archaeoraptor, but every one who did noted that it was
composite piece, and the artistic amateurs who paid for the fossil
were repeatedly warned that some parts of it might not even belong to
the whole. Popular press foolishly scooped the story prior to peer
review, where it was instantly exposed as a fake by multiple experts,
and each submission to scientific journals was immediately rejected.
Archaeoraptor therefore fooled no one in the scientific community at
all.
The irony there is that the tail of the
alleged Archaeoraptor turned out to belong to the as-yet undiscovered
Microraptor, a four-winged and apparently gliding feathered dinosaur
which turned out to be even more compelling proof of avian evolution
from dinosaurs than Archeopteryx was in Darwin’s day.
On page 486 he quotes from Time magazine, "Scientists concede that their most cherished theories are based on embarrassingly few fossil fragments and that huge gaps exist in the fossil record." (TIME Magazine, Nov. 7, 1977).
This quote is over 30 years old and
many new discoveries have happened since then.
The fossil record, though incomplete,
is by no means “embarrassing” and there are millions (not a
“few”) fossils. The notion that there are only a “few”
fossils is ludicrous, especially given that there were around a
hundred fossils discovered by the time Charles Darwin went public.
Since then, we have discovered tons of fossils, more than Darwin
could have reasonably hoped for.
On page 580, Ray states that the evidence for evolution is lacking. He mentions Kent Hovind's $250,000 prize to anyone who can prove evolution.
This is a complete lie. The evidence
for evolution is by no means “lacking.” The only thing lacking,
to the point it is absolutely nonexistent, is the honesty and
integrity of creationists and their ability to be consistent or do
honest research.
Even the challenges by creationists
demonstrate dishonest as well as their mind-numbingly incompetent and
misguided understand of the theory of evolution. Mister Kent Hovind
is a great example. His challenged is a fraud and intentionally made
impossible to pass. (see http://talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind.html)
Even Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron
create their own challenges that display the fact they don't
understand evolution whatsoever and have no intention to understand
it. Ray Comfort's challenge to anyone to present a “living
transitional fossil.” The challenge is deliberately constructed so
nothing counts, and the contact is set up to bounce all entries.
Kirk Cameron, on multiple occasions,
claimed that he had done “research” into the fossil record and
claimed he could not find a single transitional fossil. This drove
him to challenged scientists to find a transitional form like
“Crocoduck” while showing a photoshopped image of a tiny duck
body with a crocodile head. Kirk Cameron obviously lied about doing a
moment's worth of research (except for maybe psudeoscientific
conspiracy sources). Kirk has no clue what evolutionary theory
predicts, nor does he understand what a transitional fossil even is
(he is even willfully ignorant of the millions of actual transitional
fossils we have found and directly pointed out to him). Kirk
Cameron's “Crocoduck” is so moronic it is laughable. In
fact, Darwin explained in detail why we should NOT find anything like
this. We’re not looking for a blend of two species that both
currently exist. Such a thing would actually go against evolution.
Instead, Darwin said, that if his theory were true, then what we
should find would be a basal form potentially ancestral to both
current species. And in this one case alone, we’ve found dozens of
them in a near continuous lineage dating beyond the dawn of the
Mesozoic era.
On page 780 they depict a picture from a creationist pamphlet, attempting to disprove evolution.
The pamphlet is called "Big
Daddy?" It is a small anti-evolution comic book tract by
evangelist Jack Chick. From that same pamphlet grew a new lie from
creationists. In that pamphlet of supposed 'failed transitionals from
monkey to man' included the fossil of “New Guinea mam." This
fossil never existed, and from this lie sprout new creationist
propaganda, which reveals how lazy creationists are at doing their
background research (Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron are no exception).
Arguments Against the Big Bang Theory
In a Questions and objections section, they ask: 'Doesn't the big bang theory disprove the genesis account of creation?' Ray responds "Try to think of any explosion that has produced order. Does a terrorist bomb create harmony? Big bangs cause chaos. How could a big bang produce a rose, apple trees, fish, sunsets, the seasons, humming birds, polar bears-thousands of birds and animals, each with its own eyes, nose and mouth? A child can see that there is 'grand design' in creation."
This is a straw man. The big bang was
not an explosion. It was an expansion of space/time. For the sake of
argument, can bombs create order? Absolutely. Powerful explosions can
compress carbon into diamond crystals, the most ordered arrangement.
The Big Bang does not say suddenly trees, fishes, and such were made
directly afterward. Nor is the big bang what caused life. That is a
complete misunderstanding of the whole concept. Later on, once the
universe formed, elements come together. From these elements, under
environmental factors, begin to form simple organisms. Evolution
explains how life diversifies, not how it began. Since evolution at
every level is -by definition- limited to the variation of allele
frequencies inherited over generations of living organisms, then it
obviously can’t operate where no genomes yet exist. The
evolutionary process starts with genetics and can’t start before
it. The big bang (or however the universes came to be) has no real
relevance to the fact that evolution of plants and animals happened
on this planet.
In conclusion, Ray Comfort did not
answer the question. He pathetically tried to equate the Big Bang
Theory with explosions and the evolution of animals and plants. After
beating his own straw man of the Big Bang, he brushed off all the
actual scientific evidence supporting the Big Bang on a whim without
ever addressing them up front a single time.
Does the Big Bang Theory disprove
Genesis account of creation? I would argue it does destroy a literal
reading of the Bible, but since the entire story of Genesis is
completely faith-based, the beauty of faith can be molded to mean
whatever the believer wishes. Some people, despite what it says in
Genesis, have reconciled their beliefs with the Big Bang Theory,
claiming God used it to create the universe. What they ignore is that
Genesis specifically says at the start that “And the Spirit of God
was hovering over the face of the waters”...did you catch the water
being mentioned there? Why is there water before the universe even
started? According to the Big Bang, heavier elements than hydrogen
formed AFTER the inflation and creation of the universe.
Arguments Against Atheists
On page 48, Comfort talks about atheists: "It is much more reasonable to believe that this publication had no printer then to believe that there is no god. Who in his right mind would ever believe that no one compiled its pages, no one produced the graphic art, and no one printed it. The publication happened by chance...from nothing. There was no paper, no ink, no cardboard, and no glue. The paper just came into being (from nothing), and then trimmed itself into perfectly straight edges. All the words fell into place, forming coherent sentences, and then the graphic art appeared. The pages fell into numerical order, and finally the book bound itself. The fact that there was a printer is axiomatic (self-evident), so it would be intellectually insulting to even begin to argue for the case of the printers existence. For the same reason, the bible does not enter into the case for god's existence. It simply begins by stating, 'In the beginning…'
This is another
failed attempt to lash at atheists, but it gets worse: it is actually
an argument against creationism. First of all, atheism does not hold
a position that everything came from nothing. Creationists (Ray
Comfort) are the ones who believe everything came from nothing. They
believe that everything popped into existence from nothing (ex
niliho), only when a magical invisible undetectable immortal entity
suddenly decided for no reason to conduct an invocation and magically
spoke everything into being.
While it may be
“axiomatic” for a printer to make a book, this is because we can
objectively verify that the printer is real. We can test it, check
what company made it, where it was manufactures and what year it was
finished. We can contact the manufacturer, the shipping company, ask
for the blueprints, and so and on and so on.
When has Ray or
Kirk EVER presented anything to objectively verify the existence of
their “god”?
Claiming that
God's existence is “axiomatic” holds as much weight as the claim
that the Great Unga Bunga created God is axiomatic. There are many
unsupported and unprovable claims that can be called “axiomatic”
(aliens from Mars creating Earth; time-traveling Titans created this
universe; or Lord Krishna created this universe and all universes
known and unknown) but merely calling them axiomatic does not make
them so.
Claiming that the
universe needs a creator is not an argument, it is only speculation
without actual evidence. On top of that, it is an extraordinary
claim, thus requiring extraordinary evidence – and saying “it's
just self-evident” does not prove anything. And any claim made
without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
A printer is a
man-made artifact, but to compare a man-made artifact to Nature is a
false equivocation fallacy. The issue
here is that there Comfort does not distinguished between naturally
made objects versus artificially made objects,
rather he seems to insert they are all the same thing – but this is
not true. This is going way
beyond comparing apples and oranges (or perhaps bananas).
So, does this
universe need a maker like a printer does? There is no evidence for
it, and scientists are still searching for the best answer – but
that does mean they have “no idea” what happened. While there are
a couple of feasible explanations, the have repeatingly shown that
the universe is perfectly capable of forming without the assistance
of a deity.
While the Big
Bang Theory may have been the beginning of our universe, that does
not necessarily mean that it was the beginning of all that is.
Did the universe
come from nothing? This depends how one defines “nothing.” The
universe could have formed from a preexisting structureless void.
Is the universe
eternal? Many say it is. Others may say probably not, but matter and
the laws of physics are eternal. Respectable scientists like Victor
Stenger has argued that the multiverse is eternal (Atoms and the
Cosmos, page 259), which is where our universe sprouted from.
Furthermore, this
comment by Ray and Kirk is ridiculous because if creationists like
Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron claim that there must be a creator for
something to exist, then there must also be a creator for their god.
What created God? We already examined this question earlier in this
article, and have shown that Ray's response to the question was
flawed and feeble.
“It takes no brains to be an atheist. Any stupid person can deny the existence of a supernatural power because man's physical senses cannot detect it. But there cannot be ignored the influence of conscience, the respect we feel for the moral law, the mystery of first life…or the marvelous order in which the universe moves about us on this earth. All of these evidence the handiwork of the beneficent deity…” - Dwight Eisenhower
I can quote U.S. President's too.
Arguments
In Favor of Creation
On page 581, they ask a question which a skeptic might ask, then answer it: "Adam was a mythical figure who never really lived." They respond with: "Adam is a key figure in scripture. He is described as the "first Adam," the one who brought sin into this world….If Adam and Eve were not real then ought to doubt whether their children were real too, and their children…and then we ought to doubt the first 11 chapters of genesis, and so on. All the genealogies accept Adam as being a literal person, so their children Cain and Abel must be real too. Jesus was descended from Adam, and it is impossible to be descended from a myth."
It can be that both are myths (see
Jesus myth theory). The genealogy of Adam can be exaggerated or meant
in a metaphorical style.
But Ray and Kirk got it all wrong. All
humans are obviously the children of the first man, WWW. How do we
know? It says so in an ancient folklore. If you think that is
nonsense...you're right. Taking a book of folklore with the
presupposition that it is the only true one, and applying it to the
ancestry of man, is utter rubbish.
In the case for this “Adam”
claiming he is the father of all mankind with no evidence is a waste
of time. So where is the evidence for Adam? Christian creationists
have been debating that for centuries, but have brought forth
nothing.
The simple fact is, all humans share a
common ancestor with other primates. We know this for a fact. In the
same way a guy can do a paternity test to see if his dad is his real
dad, we can do the same with humans. As a result, genetics have
undoutably proven that humans do share a common ancestor with other
primates. This fact is backed up by our phylogeny, ERVs, psuedogenes,
and much more. Humans are apes.
So, where would Adam fit into this, and
where? There is no “father” of humankind. Humankind developed out
of a population, there was no single individual or couple that
started all humankind.
Scientific Facts of the Bible
"Only in recent years has science discovered that everything we see is composed of invisible atoms. Here scripture tells us that the "things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." (Hebrews 11:3)
This is what Hebrews 11:3 says:
"Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the
word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things
which do appear." This seems to imply, not that life is made up
of invisible particles, but rather that God created matter out of
nothing, which would make much more sense as a reading, since that
belief is "through faith."
"Science has discovered that stars emit radio waves, which are received on earth as a high pitch. God mentioned this in Job 38:7: When the morning stars sang together."
So the stars sing? Stars do not vocals
or lungs. In this verse, the word for "sang" means "United
in a grand chorus or concert of praise" in the sense of
being performed by humans or angels - the thing is they have mouths
and actual voices. Stars don't sing. Stars give off infrasounds, but
they cannot be heard on earth.
"Most cosmologists (scientists who study structures and evolution of the universe) agree that the genesis account of creation, in imagining an initial void, may be uncannily close to the truth." (Source: TIME Magazine, Dec. 1976)
Time magazine is not a science
article, plus it is WAY out of date. Close to nothing in Genesis
reflects how the universe actually came to be. Genesis says that the
stars were created AFTER the earth. Furthermore, the translation
"formless and void" for the Hebrew expression tohu
w'bohu is misleading. In actual fact, the pre-created cosmos in
Genesis 1:2 more closely approximates "watery chaos", and
is much more closely aligned with other ancient Near Eastern
cosmologies and creation myths.
"Science expresses the universe in five terms: time, space, matter, power, and motion. Genesis 1:1-2 revealed such truths to the Hebrews in 1450 b.c. " In the beginning [time] god created [power] the heaven [space] and the earth [matter]…And the spirit of god moved [motion] upon the face of the waters…"
This is religious literacy analysis.
The same exact argument can be used to prove the Koran. It reveals
nothing on how the universe was made, no explanation how God did
anything, leaving it all as a big mystery. Answering a mystery with a
mystery is not an answer at all.
Anyone
can do this same exact literacy analysis with any sacred book, such
as the Bhāgavata Purāṇa. The Hindu cosmology and timeline is the
closest to modern scientific timelines (several billions of years or
one day of Brahma) and even more which might indicate that the Big
Bang is not the beginning of everything but just the start of the
present cycle preceded by an infinite number of universes and to be
followed by another infinite number of universes. It also includes an
infinite number of universes at one given time.
Furthermore,
a Hindu could argue that the universe is a continual cycle of
creation and destruction - this on-going cycle can symbolize motion
and power, all taking place within space that takes time, all
concerning the origins of matter. However, just like Ray Comfort's
argument, this proves nothing except that both (and more) mythologies
include similar concepts of time, motion, matter, etc.
"Look at the specific instructions god gave his people for when they encounter disease: "And when he that has an issue is cleansed of his issue; then he shall number to himself seven days to his cleansing, and wash his clothes, and bathe his flesh in running water, and shall be clean. (Leviticus 15:13) Until recent years doctors washed their hands in a bowl of water, leaving invisible germs on their hands. However the bible says specifically to wash hands under "running water."
The
Bible says specifically to wash under "running water" but
it does not explain why
this is important. To the authors, it seems to be nothing more than a
juju ritual process set up by superstitious men who just did not have
a clue what diseases actually were. Why do I say that? Just keep
reading down Leviticus 15, it explains how to finish this
sterilization process. "...and bathe his flesh in running water,
and he shall be clean. On the eighth day, he shall take two
turtledoves, or two pigeons, and come before the Lord unto the door
of the tabernacle of the congregation and give them unto the priest,
and the priest shall offer them, one for suffering, one for burnt
offering, and the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord
for his issue."
Ray
Comfort, in his other books, talks about a doctor named Semmelweis
and credits him for discovering washed hands made the doctors cleaner
and then noticed a spike in successful pregnancies. Semmelweis did
not make his discoveries based on the Bible, because washing your
hands prior to chopping up dead burnt pigeons to appease some desert
god is more voodoo than medicine.
Science
uses precise language to minimize confusion. If this example of
putting your hands under “running water” means that the Biblical
authors were aware of “germs” then why has no one ever ever
discovered germs until within the past century? This is like a modern
day evangelist saying “my 3,000 year old book says that to perform
a certain ritual, you must do it in the shade. Therefore, they must
have known about cancer.” Sound ridiculous?
"The prophet Isaiah also tells us that the earth is round: 'It is he that sits upon the circle of the earth.' (Isaiah 40:22) This is not a reference to a flat disk, as some skeptics maintain, but to a sphere. Secular man discovered this 2,400 years later. At a time when science believed the earth was flat, it was the scriptures that inspired Christopher Columbus to sail around the world."
Simply stating that it is a sphere,
contrary to what skeptics think, without providing any evidence to
support your claims is simply wishful thinking and completely
dishonest. Reread the phrase again, notice that it says “circle”
of the Earth. The difference between a circle and a sphere is one is
2D flat like a disk or a coin, while the other one is 3D and
spherical.
In
fact, it has been discovered that the earth isn’t even a real
sphere, but an oblate spheroid with an asymmetric bulge below the
equator. Imagine that, the creator of the earth could not even get
that right.
Not to mention, there are multiple
references and verses in the bible that all point to a flat, fixed,
geocentric earth.(see
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Debunking_Christians/Page9.htm)
Arguments Defending Christianity
On page 183 in a Questions and Objections section, they say in to a common claim about the bible: "Christianity oppresses women by making them submit to their husbands." They then try to refute that claim with another Bible verse: "The bible does say, 'Wives, submit to your own husbands, and to the lord, ' but it also instructs, 'Husbands, love your wives, even as christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it.' (Ephesians 5:22,25). A man who understands that jesus christ sacrificed his life's blood for the church will likewise love his wife sacrificially and passionately. He will honor her, respect her, protect, love, and cherish her as much as he he does his own body, as he is instructed to do (Ephesians 5:28)…A godless world rejects the god given formula to make marriage work. It thinks it knows best, and suffers the heartbreaking consequences of destroyed marriages and ruined lives."
This is completely wrong. Christians
have the highest divorce rates, particularly evangelicals. The most
secular countries have the lowest divorce rates. So actual stats and
facts actually disprove Ray's claims and the Bible.
On page 204 they have a section on prayer and claims that, "god always answers prayer. Sometimes he says yes, sometimes he says no, and sometimes he says 'wait for a minute.' And since to the lord a day is a thousand years that could be a ten year wait for us."
Think about this for a moment. Try
reconstructed this sentence, but replace God with any noun. How about
"the milk carton always answers prayer. Sometimes it says yes,
sometimes it says no, and sometimes it says 'wait for a minute.' And
since to the milk carton a day is a thousand years that could be a
ten year wait for us."
You can try this yourself. Praying to a
milk carton will indeed give the same answers and results as you
would when praying to Yahweh. Prayer is just as effective as praying
to a milk carton, or any of the other deity constructed by man.
So what is the use of prayer?
Absolutely nothing. It is merely the impression that a person cares
about someone/something without actually having to do anything that
takes any effort or that actually works.
On page 524, they bring up the "if there is a building, there must be a builder" argument, and in that same section they make the claim that, "no scientific evidence has been found that homosexuals are 'born that way.' They then spout their biblical nonsense that no sexual activity should be done, unless it is within marriage, and that "homosexuality goes against god's created order and expressed will."
Ignoring the “building had a builder”
nonsense since it was already refuted with a natural rock bridge and
a face on Mars. Instead, let's just examine the claim that there is
“no scientific evidence found that that homosexuals are 'born that
way.'”
Turns out, Ray and Kirk are wrong about
that too. Besides the fact that science has presented evidence that
homosexuals are “born that way” it is apparently obvious to any
layman with a simple look at other animals and realizes homosexuality
occurs in nature.
People cannot deny that male monkeys or
penguins mating with each other instead of with the females,
especially even when the animals are filmed caught in the act.
Unfortunately some people willingly deny it, or believe that this is
not the case when it comes to human homosexuals.
Too bad for them, but there are in fact
many scientific evidences and peer-reviewed literature that prove
that homosexuals are born that way. These studies and literature are
so vast that they trump the anti-homosexual agenda-driven papers like
geologists trump flat-earthers.
For those who are unable to do a bit of
research for themselves, here are a couple of solid studies.
Finally, last thing to address: If
Christianity is all about having sex only within marriage, then the
vast majority of Christians are very poor role models. The highest
rates of STDs, teen pregnancies, and abortions in America are among
Christians. Compared to vast secular countries, the exact opposite is
true where the non-Christians are less likely to have any of these.
Abstinence only programs are a joke and clearly do not work. One
study found that teen “virginity pledges” postpone intercourse
for eighteen months on average—while, in the meantime, these virgin
teens were more likely than their peers to engage in oral and anal
sex. American teenagers engages in about as much sex as teenagers in
the rest of the developed world, but American girls are four to five
times more likely to become pregnant, to have a baby, or to get an
abortion. Young Americans are also far more likely to be infected by
HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. The rate of gonorrhea
among American teens is seventy times higher than it is among their
peers in France and in the Netherlands.
In-depth comments
Here, Comfort addresses several issues,
from personal to ethical. It also includes some depth on how to
approach and evangelize to various non-Christians.
Abortion
I'm going to
insert my own rebuttals in-between sentences.
“What
God’s Word Says About Abortion”
By Lynn Copeland. God speaks very clearly in the Bible on the value
of unborn children.
By
killing every unborn child in a flood, commanding the Istraelites to
kill all unborn babies of the Canaanites
God’s Word says
that He personally made each one of us, and has a plan for each life:
Oh, God has a
plan? If everything is God's Will, and nothing is done outside of
God's Will, then logically abortions are God’s will and the mothers
and doctors are blameless, and Christians are clueless on what they
are fighting for. However, if you admit god is imaginary and/or has
no plan, only then can the debate on abortion can commence.
#"Before I
formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you
apart" (Jeremiah 1:5)
#"Even
before I was born, God had chosen me to be His" (Galatians 1:15)
#"For You
created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb .
. . Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were
written in Your book before one of them came to be" (Psalm
139:13, 16). "Your hands shaped me and made me . . . Did You not
clothe me with skin and flesh and knit me together with bones and
sinews? You gave me life" (Job 10:8–12).
#"This is
what the Lord says—He who made you, who formed you in the womb"
(Isaiah 44:2).
#"Did not He
who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same One form us both
within our mothers?" (Job 31:15).
Because man is
made in God’s own image (Genesis 1:27) (no
evidence for this whatsoever), each life
is of great value to God: "Children are a gift from God"
(Psalm 127:3) (accept for those God
kills directly or command their parents to eat their own children).
He even calls our children His own: "You took your sons and
daughters whom you bore to Me and sacrificed them...You slaughtered
My children" (Ezekiel 16:20,21) (Wrong,
God calls the children of Israel HIS children. He does not care about
any of the other nations children. Keep reading, you see God is angry
that the children of Israel slept with the Egyptians “great of
flesh” aka “big penises.”). The
Bible says of our Creator (who created
this Earth that doesn't move), "In
His hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of every
human being" (Job 12:10). God, the giver of life, commands us
not to take the life of an innocent person: "Do not shed
innocent blood" (Jeremiah 7:6) (in
the words of Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron: Biblical
evangelism teaches man is a wicked criminal and a wicked man
(Chapter 17: The Fruit of Biblical Evangelism). Criminals are the
opposite of innocent. So by the Bible's standards, there is no
innocent blood. Ergo, since does that mean under Christianity we can
kill whoever we want?); "Cursed is
the man who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent person"
(Deuteronomy 27:25) (didn't God accept a
bet with the Devil that ended up with God deliberately killing Job's
entire family?). "You shall not
murder" (Exodus 20:13) (unless God
commands you to kill another person, then it's fine.).
Taking the life of the unborn is clearly murder—"He didn’t
kill me in the womb, with my mother as my grave" (Jeremiah
20:17)— and God vowed to punish those who "ripped open the
women with child" (Amos 1:13).
The unborn child
was granted equal protection in the law; if he lost his life, the one
who caused his death must lose his own life: "If men who are
fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but
there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined . . .But if
there is serious injury, you are to take life for life" (Exodus
21:22,23). Life is a gift created by God, and is not to be taken away
by abortion. God is "prochoice," but He tells us clearly
the only acceptable choice to make: "I have set before you life
and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and
your children may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19).
These Bible verses hint that God has
predetermined our lives eons before our parents even met. If this is
true, and God sees and knows everything that will happen in the
future (and has a plan) that would mean God is in control of all
miscarriages. Miscarriages are defined as spontaneous abortions. All
the stats show that every year there are about three to four
miscarriages per abortion Not to mention several times in the Old
Testament God purposely kills unborn children (the Global Flood,
Hosea, etc.) Based on this, God is not pro-life at all.
Pornography
Before you go
through these... have you looked at yourself under the penetrating
light of God's Law? Have you come to a place of genuine repentance?
Do you know that your heart is desperately wicked; that it's an enemy
of God? Do you see your Adamic nature as a Judas living within you,
raising his hands and crying "Master, Master," but at the
same time betraying the Son of Man with a kiss? Then put that traitor
to death. Never trust your own heart again. It cares for nothing but
self. The instant gratification of thirty pieces of silver is better
than Heaven's approval. It is self-serving, self-gratifying, and
self-deceiving. It is "earthly, sensual, devilish" (James
3:15). Look at what Philippians 2:12 says about the "self"
nature: "...work out (cultivate, carry out to the goal, and
fully complete) your own salvation with reverence and awe and
trembling (self-distrust, with serious caution, tenderness of
conscience, watchfulness against temptation, timidly shrinking from
whatever might offend God and discredit the name of Christ)"
(The Amplified Bible).
God is not in disfavor with
pornography. When God punished David for taking Bathsheba, God
commanded a man to have sex with all of David's concubines in the
open "for all of Israel to see" - meaning he made love in
broad daylight for bystanders to watch. This is pornography, minus
the TV screen.
Pornography is not harmful, but the
United States spends about a hundred times more than that to fight
the failed Drug War.
But how many Christians engage in or
purchase pornography? Studies have show that the more conservative or
religious a person is the more likely they will spend money on
pornography. http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/world-news/conservative-us-states-found-to-be-biggest-porn-consumers_100160982.html and http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Business/Story?id=6977202&page=1
- Would you ever take pornography to church and look at it during worship? You may as well, because God is just as present in your bedroom as He is in the church building.
Depends on
which church you go to. Several Christian ministers preach naked on
the altar. Once upon a time, worshippers would actually have sex with
the Priestesses. Plus, this argument is based on the presupposition
that Ray's narrow version of God is real.
- Face the fact that you may not be saved. Examine yourself to ensure that Christ is living in you (2 Corinthians 13:5). See Romans 6:11–22; 8:1–14; Ephesians 5:3–8.)
What is there
to be saved from? In all of Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron's religious
career, not once had they shown any evidence or reason that we need
help or need to be saved from anything.
- Realize that when you give yourself to pornography, you are committing adultery (Matthew 5:27,28).
- Grasp the serious nature of your sin. Jesus said that it would be better for you to be blind and go to heaven, than for your eye to cause you to sin and end up in hell (Matthew 5:29).
- Those who profess to be Christians yet give themselves to pornographic material evidently lack the fear of God (Proverbs 16:6). Cultivate the fear of God by reading Proverbs 2:1–5.
- Read Psalm 51 and make it your own prayer.
- Memorize James 1:14,15 and 1 Corinthians 10:13. Follow Jesus’ example (Matthew 4:3–11) and quote the Word of God when you are tempted (see Ephesians 6:12–20).
- Make no provision for your flesh (Romans 13:14; 1 Peter 2:11). Get rid of every access to pornographic material—the Internet, printed literature, TV, videos, and movies. But don't just stop there... you also need to begin to think about how high God's standard of holiness and purity really is. What the general public would have called "pornographic" just 60 to 70 years ago is plastered through your Sunday morning newspaper, the billboards you see on your way to work, and the magazines that line the counters at the grocery checkout. Even television commercials are filled with images that if you printed them off and stood in front of an elementary school showing them to children... you would be arrested. The fire is being fed from all different directions... not just those that the world lables as "pornographic." You must stop feeding the fire.
- Guard your heart with all diligence (Proverbs 4:23). Don’t let the demonic realm have access to your thought-life. The Bible commands you to get control of your thoughts; read what Romans 13:14 says, "But clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah), and make no provision for [indulging] the flesh [put a stop to thinking about the evil cravings of your physical nature] to [gratify its] desires (lusts)" (The Amplified Bible - bold added for emphasis). If you give yourself to it, you will become its slave (Romans 6:16). Read the Bible daily, without fail. As you submit to God, the devil will flee (James 4:7,8).
- The next time temptation comes, do fifty push-ups, then fifty sit-ups. If you are still burning, repeat the process (see 1 Corinthians 9:27, and 1 Corinthians 7:9). This is not just a random "get your mind off it" exercise. This produces a physical reaction that is the equivalent of what is often called a "cold shower."
Quote-Mining
On page 798 "The Evidence Bible claims that Sir Arthur Keith wrote the forward to the 100th edition of Origin of the Species, and wrote: ""Evolution is unproved and unprovable. We believe it only because the only alternative is special creation which is unthinkable." (Keith, Arthur, forward to 100th anniversary edition of Charles Darwin's Origin of Species, 1959)
The quote that
is attributed to Sir Arthur Keith is a figment of the creationists
imagination. No library in the Atlanta metro area has this particular
edition and neither Amazon nor Barnes and Noble has this edition. A
search of the internet showed many references for this quote but
every one of them was from a creationist site. It is also amazing
because that Sir Arthur died in 1955 and the 100th anniversary
edition would not have been issued until 1959.
They also quote a H.S. Lipson, who is a
professor of physics (at least used to be- this quote is old from
what info I can find, from 1980) at the University of Manchester, UK:
"In fact, evolution became in a sense a scientific religion;
almost all scientists have accepted it and many are prepared to
'bend' their observations to fit in with it." H Lipson spoke
skeptically about evolution in 1980 or so; but he is not an
evolutionist; and as far as can be gathered he had nothing to do with
the Supreme Court in the US.
Evidence Bible Homepage
Arizona Atheist book review
