From: ds0007@medtronic.COM (Dale Skiba)
Subject: Re: YOUNG EARTHERS _AND_ BIBLE CRITICS WATCH OUT! (huh?)
Followup-To: talk.origins,talk.religion.misc
Organization: Medtronic, Inc.
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 16:36:26 GMT

Jon Livesey (livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com) wrote:
: In article <MMEYER.92Dec30130453@m2.dseg.ti.com>, mmeyer@m2.dseg.ti.com (Mark Meyer) writes:
: |> 
: |> 	Thought y'all might like to look at this thing that showed up
: |> in talk.religion.misc.  Seems right up your alley.
: |> 
[...]
: |> Summary
: |> -------
: |> The "higher critics" of the last two centuries have badly
: |> misinterpreted the first two chapters of Genesis, and by their error
: |> led many astray.  Establishing the correct point of view and initial
: |> conditions for the Genesis creation chronologies yields a sequence of
: |> events in perfect harmony with modern science. .....etc

: So the guy can look at Modern Science *first*, and then take the
: Bible, and munge it around a bit, and make it compatible, and then....

Well, this is alot better than what the ICR people do  :-)

ICR folks look at their special interpretation of the Bible
*first* and then look at science, and munge it around a lot, ...

I think there are some important differences between Hugh and
the typical ICR creationist.  Hugh at least knows a great deal
about his field Astrophysics.  From what I've read of their work,
ICR types usually only pretend to be knowledgable in their fields.

He also knows that scientific research DOES reveal truth about
nature.  He also knows that the Bible should not be read as a
Science textbook.  ICR types have a different opinion on this.

It is my guess that after he saw their "ICR style" christian
'research' and concluded it was basicly warped, he realized
that their view of Genesis was probably warped as well.  So
he may have decided to try some munging on his own.  He couldn't
do any worse than what the ICR types did.  :-)

: |> The odds that Moses could have guessed the correct order even if he
: |> were given the events are 1 chance in 40 million.

: What "correct order" are we talking about here?   The "correct order"
: after Ross munged things around to be compatible with Modern Science?

: How surprising is that?

: jon.

He may have munged things a bit too much to get this number.
Genesis says things start out with water.  Also, few things
in the sequence of creation seem to be out of sequence with
what we know today.  So, this 1/40M seems a bit extreme.

IMHO he should say that we should have some comfort that the
general order of Genesis 1 somewhat agrees with today's science.

This seems to be his major problem.  I have read this book.
Several times he comes up with a statement like:

/We observe X, this X proves that God exists and did Y./

I think it would be more accurate if he instead wrote:

/We observe X, this X gives some evidence that God exists
and did Y.  I personally think this is strong evidence./

Even with these problems, I get a completely different feeling
from reading Ross's book than from the ICR literature.  He
says some things I do not agree with, but I don't think he
is intentionally deceiving people like ICR style authors do.

--
Dale Skiba