Comment on Panda’s Thumb: ‘SDAs are split over evolution’ by Oink.
@Eddie:
re.: “Few if any [SDA scientists] care to engage in a public debate.”
Eddie, Eddie, Eddie! Where have you been! Where have you been! All those Taylor seminars, over the years. The books (Bull, Guy, et al). The Spectrum editorials and articles, going back long before witch hunts were even gleams in EduT’s eye, debating everything, not just Genesis 1. And check Adventist Today archives. Don’t forget Adventist Perspective. And how could you not notice all the Professors taking happy issue with EduTruth, right here, within 3 inches of us?
If there’s one thing all our progressive media and professors have always demanded it is DEBATE! Out-in-the-open debate! “Debate! We must have it!” And if there’s one place where they’ve put their feet and not just their mouth, it’s debate. If there’s one thing they’re good for, it’s debate. They have delivered, and delivered, and delivered. Spectrum Blog Editor wants you to know it’s been going on for 40 years. You do all these scholars a sorry injustice, presenting them as not debating.
Dr. Pitman is a johnny-come-lately to the debate scene.
But, hmmmm, you said “SDA science professors.†Taken literally (rather than allegorically), that could, yes, disqualify a lot of our debate-happy scholars, even scientists. Like, Dr. Taylor, an SDA scientist (anthropology, radiometric dating) if there ever was one, and a debater if there ever was one, but you’re not talking about him. You’re excluding him on a technicality. He’s not employed by any SDA university, just a sought-after visiting professor and adviser there. So you’re excluding him, of all people? He does post here ever so often but that doesn’t count as debate, granted. He just drops by to rib and rail, not debate. But he gives a mean seminar, frequently in our churches, plus all those visiting-professor lectures, and his Adventist Today, which he founded just for debate. Knowing Erv, I suspect it would irk him to deny he debates. But if you must.
And, yes, it is true that many of the SDA PhDs demanding debate, and debating full decibels ahead and debating their heads off, aren’t scientists at all (philosophy, communication, political science, history, ethics, education, etc.), but they sure talk like scientists, and seem to have assumed honorary science degrees, which it would be wrong-headed to contest. Don’t they count?
Which raises the old debate, speaking of debates, about whether an MD can ever really be a “scientist.†If he isn’t (as I, an old MD research fellow, have heard PhDs in the same university insist), you can rightly exclude from your list of debating SDA scientists an especially prominent LLU MD, author of a very effective, frankly disputative anti-Genesis 1 book, with another coming up. But, then, you’ll have to exclude S. Pitman, MD, himself.
But you do have a point: our tenured and hired LSU professors have indeed shown disinclination to debate students in class or Dr. Pitman in person, on campus. So little do they relish going public that they cringe when they are filmed in the act. Alas, you’re right after all.
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Oink Also Commented
Panda’s Thumb: ‘SDAs are split over evolution’
@Professor Kent:
Our dear professor Kent, A question to you, sir, if we may.
But first, what is not in question: that a 6-day creation is true and SDA institutions should still teach it, but there is not a shred of scientific evidence for it. It is to be defended on faith alone. On that you could not make your position clearer.
So should creation be taught only in our Departments of Religion, Philosophy, and Ethics, and not in our Biology Departments?
Panda’s Thumb: ‘SDAs are split over evolution’
@Professor Kent:
But you didn’t answer my question! Answer my question! Is this your catch-question of the day, dude?
(Apologies, apologies for plagiarizing you word for word, plus a little artful rewording, also in homage . Do keep it coming.)
Panda’s Thumb: ‘SDAs are split over evolution’
@Professor Kent:
“would YOU walk away too…like Dr. Pitman?” (to flesh out your question.) Your catch-question of the day?
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