"Consider an extreme literalist , asked to put the two Genesis accounts side by side and then asked , `` according to the two accounts , on what day was man created ? `` Everyone not a literalist can see that the two accounts conflict when read literally . But I 've known literalists say , `` I see no contradiction `` - and they meant it ."
"Because their axiom is that the bible is infallible , so any problems with reading it are the reader 's fault , whereas yours is that contradiction implies error . What Ken 's saying is that we ca n't draw a distinction between your axioms and those of a bible literalist in terms of which is 'right ' , because axioms are stated not proved : axioms define what is 'right ' . To reiterate : his error is in forgetting that the universe operates according to its own axioms , whatever they may be , and we can judge whether or not our axioms are congruent ."
"But I 've known literalists say , `` I see no contradiction `` - and they meant it ."
"whereas yours is that contradiction implies error ."