Nah, not missing a thing by everything I've learned in all my years.
So by not suspending logic and not taking a leap of faith that an old man in the sky designed all of us is being "lazy and stupid"? The entire concept of faith is suspending logic at some point. If you believe in god and religion, great for you, but you have can't call someone "lazy and stupid" for not taking the same leap of faith.
Do you think Muslims are "lazy and stupid" because they were raised to believe in the wrong religion? Jews? Buddhists? Hindus? Mormons? What makes their beliefs "lazy and stupid" but yours totally the result of high level intelligence and a strong work ethic?
Boy, are you going to be:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TnkJ8_BmSI
I seen the world..in the full earth...and it is out there.
This is a whole load of horseshit.
Moreover, the whole, "you're wrong, because SCIENCE" thing is stupid and played out. I love how in the span of 30 minutes I can hear the same politician or the same commentator claim that man-made global warning is settled science, then claim that biological science of birthed gender is not real and people can choose their gender, then claim that religion is a crock, because SCIENCE, then ignore the anatomical science of an unborn baby and call it "a clump of cells."
In other words, people like to use science to support an argument, and then ignore it when it disproves an argument. I suspect you're one of those people.
Boy too much to unpack in all this but I'll be brief on each.
First, two main Biblical beliefs about earth age. One is it is millions of years old as day in OT Genesis is interpreted as a long period of time. Most Christians believe in the other view of Biblical historical documents - proven if you pull all world history and Biblical geneology together the earth is around 6000 years old. That is not stupid to believe that which is what you said. Flat earth has science and the earth being young has history. Young earth does not go against science either. Carbon dating has been proven unreliable. Living mollusks have dated thousands of years old and many more studies. Carbon dating uses extrapolation of unknown data. Big errors in other places too.
As far as rational competence so for those that don't believe in God, can anyone explain for nothing times nothing equals everything? That is what those that believe evolution believe. It takes more faith to be a non believer than it does a Christian. Science and Christianity are not at odds, they are perfectly aligned.
I don't rule out some kinda force, energy, spirit, whatever, something that's out there that created the universe and what's even outside the universe that we are expanding into. But that's not the same thing as believing any one religion is the one that got god right, which is what anyone who claims to be religious believes. Everyone believes they are the right religion and the others are the wrong religion with no more evidence than the book they were told to believe when they were kids. As far as where the universe came from, obviously there was some kinda force. Whether that was god in the concept that religion tends to view god that caused the Big Bang or there's some scientific explanation we still haven't figured out that we just call "god", who knows, but I'm plenty fine assuming none of humanity's various religions have gotten it right about whatever god is out there pulling the strings. Just be kind to others and treat them how you want to be treated and it'll all work out in the end.
That you don?t think it?s a ridiculous notion is a ridiculous notion. If the brain and the physical body aren?t syncing up about something as fundamental as that, it?s because of conscious decision making and not some faulty wiring.
There are some legitimately transgendered people in this world...I?m not going to deny that. But the volume is extremely minuscule. Otherwise, like the kid in kindergarten cop said, ?boys have a penis, and girls have a ******.? SCIENCE! Being gay is one thing, but saying you identify as a woman when you are clearly a dude is pretty much a textbook example of mental illness.
But the whole point of my post was that if you will ignore obvious science to debate this point, don?t come back later and cite science to make an argument for something else.
I have been in the part of this world where the stories from the Bible took place for a good while. If you can come over here and deal with these people and still believe that they have ever had any clue as to who the true God is (or if there really is a God), then more power to you. Most of these idiots can't walk and chew bubble gum at the same time. Maybe they were a lot smarter 5 thousand years ago. Do you guys know what the average IQ was back then? I mean the things they used to do and believe in are ridiculous. I don't know what the truth is, but I'm equally confident that no one over here has ever had a clue either. That does not mean that there aren't some really good things to live by in multiple religions. I tend to think that people of devout religion have seen drastic improvements in their life because most religions are full of really good teachings that are great to live by in general (minus the nutjobs that want to blow people up or massacre people in the name of religion). If you follow actually the teachings of Christianity, you're generally going to be a pretty good dude and be a nice person. Your life is going to improve. That's awesome. I don't think it proves anything else. Maybe I'm wrong. I think if I go to hell for not believing something that can't be proven and happened thousands of years ago then that's not really fair.
anyway.......
As for the Chris Jones flat earth......I don't care. Hope he continues to do well and makes a boatload of money.
Just an observation I've made is the same scientists that don't believe in a Creator have no problem believing in something they can't detect and is purely theoretical they call dark matter and dark energy. They have to have it to make the math work for their theories. Personally I think people are hardwired to believe in something, whether it's science, religion or their politics.
It?s possible to be a creationist and still be rational. I think far too many Christians try to put God in a box. Research the Gap Theory. It is a wonderful theory of creation, followed by re-creation. It takes into account ?old earth?. Basically we just simply believe that ?in the beginning? and ?on the first day? are two separate events.
You couldn't be more wrong here, in literally every statement.
1. Carbon Dating....does it have limitations? Sure, almost all chemical analyses do, but C14 dating has improved dramatically in it's precision over the last 50 years. The calibrations have been finessed and are constantly checked and rechecked against standards. Many of the dates generated in its early days have been corrected.
2. Not sure why you'd even bring this up in a discussion about the Earth's age. It may come as a surprise to you, but C14 is not used to date the really really old materials from millions of years ago, i.e., fossils, volcanic eruptions, stratigraphy, etc.; different methods are used for that, such as Potassium-Argon, Lead Isotopes, Uranium Isotopes. The reason for this is because C14 dating has an age threshold of ca. 50-60 thousand years, and this limitation is pretty essential to our understanding of how Carbon 14 decays and it's ratio with C13.
3. What is this "proof" you speak of?
4. "Carbon dating uses extrapolation of unknown data"....what are you talking about here? C14 dating as a method and concept is actually pretty straight forward, and the "data" are certainly not "unknown".
5a. "Living mollusks have been dated to thousands of years old and many more studies"....ok, wth are you talking about here? Yeah, there are mollusks living today that, when their growth bands are counted, show that they've been alive for thousands of years....What does that have to do with C14 or the age of the Earth?
5b. There is a species of mollusk called Exogyra costata that went extinct at the end of the Cretaceous Period (60 million years ago), and you can find it's remains in abundance on and around MSU's campus, if you're so inclined (check the bluffs out by the disc golf course...can literally pick them up off the ground).
Beardo is not your adversary in this. His position is that Christians are not all fundamentalist/biblical literalists and I see your point too.
Probably my oldest friend on this board pointed out to me years ago whenI was laughing about Scientology and it?s assertions about exploding volcanos, that my faith?s miracles was no less irrational. And he was absolutely correct. It probably shaped my belief from that moment forward.
Man?s INABILITY to understand or prove something is no indication of its impossibility.