[NeedKarma]

I think you missed my point. But we can agree to disagree.

[dwashbur]

I think you missed my point. But we can agree to disagree.

Triund said this:

For me science is a baby of Lord God. If HE has not given humans understanding, how could a man find out how far is the sun, or deep is the ocean, or how can we take care of our health and do more work for HIM.

In other words, the fact that we have the capability to reason (understanding) has led to all these discoveries. For some reason, you draw this conclusion about that idea:

I think that does a disservice to man's use of free will to be ingenious and have a quest for better understanding his environment. It reduces every single argument to "God did it".

But Triund's statement says nothing about man's use of free will; in fact it says that very "free will to be ingenious and have a quest for better understanding" is a gift of God. It most certainly does not lead to the idea that "God did" all of it. God made it possible, yes. But your conclusion does not follow from that. The ability to reason is indeed a gift; in fact, the development of reason from non-reason is one of the major conundrums for naturalistic philosophy, because the odds of it happening without some kind of outside guidance are so astronomical as to be impossible. We are free and responsible to make use of that reasoning ability, and that's where man's part comes in. Hence, your statement that "It reduces every single argument to 'God did it'" is a non-sequitur.

[NeedKarma]

Hence, your statement that "It reduces every single argument to 'God did it'" is a non-sequitur.

Not at all. If your answer to man's ability to understand his environment is simply that "it's a gift from God" with no supporting evidence then you can say that about pretty anything since you are not obligated to offer any supported evidence as I have.

[dwashbur]

Not at all. If your answer to man's ability to understand his environment is simply that "it's a gift from God" with no supporting evidence then you can say that about pretty anything since you are not obligated to offer any supported evidence as I have.

You haven't offered any "evidence" any more than I have. All you did was give examples of it at work. That's not any kind of evidence of how it came about. Nice try, though. You say I call it a gift from God "with no supporting evidence" and suggest I can't legitimately do that, yet you can say "it just happened" with no supporting evidence and that's supposed to be okay. Wrong. There's no actual "supporting evidence" either way, at least not the kind you claim, so you're making a faith statement just as much as anybody else is.

[NeedKarma]

... yet you can say "it just happened" with no supporting evidence and that's supposed to be okay.

Could you kindly point to where I said that?

[dwashbur]

Could you kindly point to where I said that?

"you are not obligated to offer any supported evidence as I have." What evidence? Evidence of what? You appear to be denying that reason/intelligence is a gift from God, which doesn't leave many alternatives. If you're not saying it came about by chance ("just happened") then what exactly are you saying?

[Cindersarah]

circle is closer than the square that the world was thought to be. And I didn't learn that a ball was the same thing as a sphere until grade three. :P

Anyway, my thinking is... science was originally done to try and understand God's Creation. You can't be a christian and refuse to go to science class because you don't believe in it... (I wish that could be an excuse though. :P ) I agree with the comments above however, when science is opposing what the bible says, like God is the creator of everything, yadda yadda, that's when you start raising questions. Like the Big Bang theory... where random things in the universe collided together to create the world that we live in now... sounds very iffy to me... So pray, and use your judgement on whether the science is truthful in God's eyes or not. Hope that helps!

[Teddy3indc]

Muslims have no problem with this question. God created everything, to include the laws of nature, to teach us about his mercy, and the real believers recognize that the mercy, the guidance, and the senses are one in the same type of reminder.

I hope that you find your way.

[biblebob]

Reasons To Believe: Hugh Ross, Fazale Rana, Kenneth Samples, David Rogstad, Jeff Zweerink is written by an astronomer and Christian. He believes the universe is 1 billion years old and the 6 days of creation were 6 "Yom" (hebrew for an era of time) The actual text is Yom not Day...

[TUT317]

Reasons To Believe: Hugh Ross, Fazale Rana, Kenneth Samples, David Rogstad, Jeff Zweerink is written by an astronomer and Christian. he believes the universe is 1 billion years old and the 6 days of creation were 6 "Yom" (hebrew for an era of time) The actual text is Yom not Day...

Hi Bob,

An interesting idea but I don't see any real advantage in this type of analysis.

In the end I think only science can tell us how old the earth is or how old the universe is. Otherwise we are faced with the impossible task of deciding when a day is not a day.

The earth was created in 6 days and nothing seems clearer. Anyone who suggests differently is putting forward the possibility of a marginal explanation. In other words, 6 days of creation may not be a totally acceptable explanation given what we know about science. To say that one day is really a thousand years is to create another marginal explanation.This requires a further refinement and a different time proposal as an explanation and so on. It is pretty much an exercise in futility. I don't think we will find the answer in this type of analysis.

Regards

Tut