You are correct but where do you find that evidence …

Comment on Science, Methodological Naturalism, and Faith by Sean Pitman.

You are correct but where do you find that evidence with any sort of fidelity?

How can I be correct given your own argument that some future discovery will always be found to support your position?

My answer is the peer reviewed literature the canonical literature of scientific knowledge not on blogs or missives from the DI.

As for peer review I simply suggest that what nature today asks of reviewers is not much different than in 1900.

“High quality refereeing is vital for a robust peer review process. So, what constitutes an ideal report? Most importantly, the report should provide an objective and thorough evaluation of the study’s potential impact, judged in the context of the published literature, and its technical aspects. Careful scrutiny of the data to determine whether they substantiate the main conclusions of the work, accompanied by specific recommendations to fill gaps is essential. Other key issues to highlight in the report include the data quality and presentation, methodology, statistical analysis, strength of the conclusions, clarity of the text and appropriate citation of the literature.”

We’re only talking about how to rationally, scientifically, recognize true artefacts of design. You yourself claim that some of the examples listed are “blindingly obvious” – so much so that it would be pointless even publishing a paper on why they are actually artificial rather than natural. The problem is that the detection of a true artefact does in fact require the use of scientific methodologies and the artefact hypothesis is always open to potential falsification – as is any truly scientific hypothesis.

The fact that you wouldn’t publish any argument regarding the potentially artificial nature of anything within any living thing highlights your own bias – and the bias of your peers who simply dismiss, out of hand, any and all arguments for the artificial nature of any aspect of living things. The fear is that living things are more special than granite cubes and/or radio signals and that if any aspect of a living thing is accepted as being a “blindingly obvious artefact” that people will simply assume that God was the designer – even if the level of intelligence required is no greater than that needed to explain a simple polished granite cube.

That is why publishing today on issues that fundamentally challenge the philosophical beliefs of most scientists simply isn’t going to happen – as you yourself confirm. Einstein got a pass because of the support of Max Planck and a few others…

Sean Pitman Also Commented

Science, Methodological Naturalism, and Faith
What is interesting is that the older the creation/Flood stories (which are practically universal in cultures around the world), the closer they match the Biblical account. In other worlds, the evidence at hand strongly favors that the Biblical account in the original account from which all other accounts are derived. Also, the details of the Biblical account described in Genesis are supported by archaeological evidence that confirms various details long believed to be in question or even mythical – such as the existence of Sodom and Gomorrah and the other cities that were catastrophically destroyed (mentioned in the same order in the Ebla Tablets).

In any case, you’re not mentioning anything new here. These attempts to challenge Biblical credibility have been around for a long time. However, the Bible keeps trumping all efforts to undermine its credibility. It has shown itself to be the most reliable historical text that we have. No other historical text or resource comes remotely close.

For a further discussion along these lines, to include a discussion of the origin of the 7-day weekly cycle in history, see: http://ssnet.org/blog/origin-of-sabbath-7-day-week/


Science, Methodological Naturalism, and Faith
Thank you for your clarification Bob. I certainly agree.


Science, Methodological Naturalism, and Faith

Thanks Bob for your candour in recoznizing the likelihood of redaction in the Bible. What got left out, amended, embellished?

As already noted, the names of places were likely updated over time, but not the historical narrative – information which was lost outside of the Scriptural accounts. In fact, this is one of the best evidences that the authors cited by Scripture really did write these accounts in their own day.


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Thank you Ariel. Hope you are doing well these days. Miss seeing you down at Loma Linda. Hope you had a Great Thanksgiving!


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Thank you Colin. Just trying to save lives any way I can. Not everything that the government does or leaders do is “evil” BTW…


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Only someone who knows the future can make such decisions without being a monster…


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Where did I “gloss over it”?


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I fail to see where you have convincingly supported your claim that the GC leadership contributed to the harm of anyone’s personal religious liberties? – given that the GC leadership does not and could not override personal religious liberties in this country, nor substantively change the outcome of those who lost their jobs over various vaccine mandates. That’s just not how it works here in this country. Religious liberties are personally derived. Again, they simply are not based on a corporate or church position, but rely solely upon individual convictions – regardless of what the church may or may not say or do.

Yet, you say, “Who cares if it is written into law”? You should care. Everyone should care. It’s a very important law in this country. The idea that the organized church could have changed vaccine mandates simply isn’t true – particularly given the nature of certain types of jobs dealing with the most vulnerable in society (such as health care workers for example).

Beyond this, the GC Leadership did, in fact, write in support of personal religious convictions on this topic – and there are GC lawyers who have and continue to write personal letters in support of personal religious convictions (even if these personal convictions are at odds with the position of the church on a given topic). Just because the GC leadership also supports the advances of modern medicine doesn’t mean that the GC leadership cannot support individual convictions at the same time. Both are possible. This is not an inconsistency.