@Victor Marshall: Thank you. May I assert, however, that …

Comment on The Credibility of Faith by wesley kime.

@Victor Marshall: Thank you.

May I assert, however, that I was not thinking in terms of presenting an argument for beauty per se, as a stand-alone dissertation, more appropriate for a seminar on aesthetics by the psychology or art department than a professorial blog-speak debate on creation, where it always is just a pretty little bouquet to add class to the ambiance, and the professors just march on by without a sniff, as is the professorial wont, to their loss. But that’s another matter. I see beauty mainly as an argument, no, proof, for creation, by God, thus as relevant to this discussion as it is, alas, strange.

wesley kime Also Commented

The Credibility of Faith
It is emerging from the present thread within a thread that whereas to the eyes of some the instant creation of a man from dust remains refractorily problematic, even somehow funny, while assembly, if not creation, of amino acids over eons from primordial soup is oh-please-may-it-be probable, the creation of straw men all over the blogscape is a snap. But seriously, theistic folks, if in your vast though not blind faith you allow God to create man over millions of years, as evo says, from basic compounds now known as “dust” (which also happens to be the technical term for the stuff littering cosmic space, from which suns are fabricated, no question), why not let Him do it rather more quickly, should He want to, as His book says?


The Credibility of Faith
I’m going to say this knowing what it will evoke — academic hurumphs from both sides (having been, at one point, an academic, I know the academic mind and mode full well, and what to expect of it and from it); the guffaws; the sarcasms (as is my own wont); even the merriment over such a breach of debating decorum, and the gleeful declarations of “see – you’re all not just flat earthers but SILLY flat earthers,” and the apologies for me and embarrassment of me. Or maybe just nothing. Still, it must be said. I think an Adventist should say it. Of all people an Adventist can say it.

There is proof for Creation. Not just from fossils, as Evoeans must settle for. Not just in data, of which there are rather more for Creation than the sadly fossilized and ossified scientific community acknowledges or peer-reviews except in jest. But it’s out there, here in the human soul and heart and mind, frontal as well as temporal lobes, there in the cosmos. Proof, call it evidence, call it data, don’t call it just faith — overwhelmingly convincing and overwhelmingly scoffable.

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmanent showeth His handiwork. Day upon day uttereth speech, and night upon night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard (reference: Ps 19), although academia is pretty deaf to it. Lost in the quantum quibbling and Hubble hubbub. Magnificently falsifiable.

But the sheer beauty of it is deafening and is not falsifiable. It is proof. A backlit cloud, long shadows on a slow green hill, a September maple tree, a May apple tree; fragrance; what comes from a violin, or can; children; just the beauty sings out the proof. DNA may offer irreducible and falsifiable proof, but beauty is not false, is transcendent, just look. But evo cannot. There is no place in evo for beauty. It can only see, and gloat over, ugly, aka evil. Only Creation, being the image of God, is attuned to beauty. Beauty is truth – still, postmodernism be damned.

Somehow, God calling it into existence in 6 days, and calling it good, and then telling us that he did so, there is beauty in that that is leached out by his taking 500,000,000 years (just when, at what point, would He call it good?), and Darwin, to do it. The only beauty in evolution, even with God somewhere in it, is the blank awesomeness of eons and eons and eons, distilled into gigabytes of peer-reviewed data.

Knowing full well that this thread – The Credibility (not Credulity) of Faith thread — is the most vulnerable, yet the strongest, of all threads, I, with respect plus abandon, submit, gentlemen, beauty.

Have a good day.


The Credibility of Faith
From the copious posts herein and leitmotif thereof, and some of the more precious phrasings, the following draft of a manifesto of Postadventist academic doctrine has emerged, by legend Twittered from a corn field: Whereas there are no absolutes any more; and Whereas there is absolutely not a shredy-shred-shred-shred of evidence for what God said about Creation; and Whereas there is absolute evidence for what Darwin said about evolution; and Whereas Therefore there is absolutely no reason extrapolatable from anything logical or physical, ergo devolving only upon absolute loyalty to our culture, as legalistic and repressive as it is, or one-upsmanship, or simple cosmic desperation: We do hereby proclaim, in academic catalog, blog, and uTube, our absolute faith in a peer-reviewed God who created evil, if nothing else, anciently personified as Satan. Therefore Be It Known that the rest of you are absolute toxic and on a slippery slope, and we’re sorry for you, o ye of little faith.
The above wording is not absolute, no wording is, especially Nobody’s. Nuance to taste.


Recent Comments by wesley kime

Dr. Walter Veith and the anti-vaccine arguments of Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche
Informative and stimulating, but proceeding into more confusion. A veteran of Moderna vaccinations, I trust, hope, they are effective, at least until otherwise. The whole business, being part of End Times, is in the hands of God, not humans expert and as degreed as they may be.


Brilliant and Beautiful, but Wrong
Brilliant, beautiful, and so right! Speaking of your presentation at LLU recently. Great to see you and your family (especially my namesake, Wes. God bless! WK


Complex Organisms are Degenerating – Rapidly
@Bob Helm: Dr. Sanford is very familiar to most of us. He was invited to speak at LLU several years ago and I and a great many were privileged to hear him.


Evolution from Space?
Hats off yet again to Sean for pursuing this topic as a scientist should, no nonsense, and in it’s proper setting — as a revival of one of the ancient ideas recently upgraded as a desperate alternative to the increasingly compelling intelligent design data. I had occasion to review panspermia a few years ago and as is my wont I found it more amusing than scientific. If you would like what was intended to be a satirical response to panspermia and other related curiosities you could check out: http://www.iessaythere.com/black-hole-humor.html
Meantime, Sean’s article is of far more cogent worth.


The Sabbath and the Covenants (Old vs. New)
As he has done on this site many times, Sean in his line-by-line-item response to C. White (not EG or EB) has, to my mind, clearly enunciated the issue and resolution.

When all the hermeneutics, quoting, and arguing and inordinately judgmental riposte are over, it comes down, as I understand it, to two things: 1) Whether the 7th day Sabbath (whether enunciated in the famous 10 commandments or otherwise) is still valid, and 2) Does the grace obtained by the vicarious sacrifice by the shedding of Christ’s blood or other divine process too deep for us to understand in this life, cover every sin automatically and without ado, altogether passively on our part, or is it only on condition that we first totally and deeply accept it? Other details always hassled forever are distractions.

I accept that I must accept it, wholly, actively, even with agony, with my whole being.