Science And The Bible

[C_Mucius_Scaevola]

I am hugely impressed that you managed to get not just one, but three separate people to read my post, and to produce video responses to it, in such a short space of time.

Sadly, as I am not able to watch video online, your efforts were wasted. Although they really would be anyway, as I was asking YOU what YOU thought was absurd about my description of evolution.

Could you perhaps do me the courtesy of writing your own response to the question?

I can watch video online, and I watched the third video in the post, the one entitled "An Atheist Professor Destroys Evolution". That's 7 minutes and 35 seconds I'll never get back.

To start with, he doesn't destroy evolution. He doesn't destroy anything, except maybe his own credibility. All he does is assert that creation is a better explanation than evolution, without providing a shred of evidence. Oh, well, maybe one piece of evidence, but that's purely anecdotal: the classic story of the arrogant atheist professor bested in a discussion with a student. We don't hear much of the discussion, only smippets like "Last month you taught that mutations are genetic disasters. How by natural selection can they produce new and better structures?" as one of the questions that stumped him. I'm no professor, but even I know that's bullshit; the majority of mutations are neither harmful nor beneficial. And that's the quality of his "evidence".

I didn't bother watching the other two videos, but I doubt if they're much better.

 

[bleubird]

never understood why people of faith are threaten by science. Oh,the magic miracle thing.Too lazy to read books so god did it.My favorite magic is metallurgy.

 

[credoconsolans]

Mostly to do with women and their periods, aren't they?

The Romans brought the concept of bathing regularly to most of the Middle Easterners.

Blood, childbirth,

What's wrong with either of these?

circumcision

Benefits are still being debated.

cleanness

Considering they didn't bathe often in the desert, I find this claim dubious.

dead bodies

Doesn't every civilization have rules about dead bodies?

fat (dietary restriction)

What's wrong with fat?

fecal matter

Since they weren't bathing often or washing their clothes often, any laws I'm sure were merely a formality.

food

None of which have proven to be any more beneficial than anyone else's diet at the time.

leprosy

So no one else at the time dealt with this?

menstruation

Nothing wrong with menstruation at all.

Not seeing anything in the laws that anyone else hadn't already come up with and I am seeing some laws that are entirely cultural and patriarchal and have nothing to do with hygiene.

 

[Keith&Co.]

cleanness

Considering they didn't bathe often in the desert, I find this claim dubious.

Maybe not.
Jews that kept Kosher during the Middle Ages would keep vermin out of their homes, so when the rats spread bubonic plague, they were far less affected.
They also did not touch the corpses of dead rats so the deadrat fleas didn't transfer nearly as often. So they were even more protected during the Black Death.
Of course, the enlightened Christains that were being decimated by the Plague saw that the Jews were largely healthy, assumed they were being protected by Satan, the Jews and their property was often burned for the sin of witchcraft. 'S funny as Hell, really. They had a contract with God and other people who assumed they had an exclusive contract, with the same god, figured they had a contract with the Devil.

God never once stopped the vigilantes to point out, "No, idiots, THEY'RE the ones who got it RIGHT!" Not even an angelic message to observe certain verses or to at least listen to the Christkillers....

So all in all, the advanced knowledge in The Books came out as a wash...

 

[credoconsolans]

Considering they didn't bathe often in the desert, I find this claim dubious.

Maybe not.
Jews that kept Kosher during the Middle Ages would keep vermin out of their homes, so when the rats spread bubonic plague, they were far less affected.

Weren't the early Hebrews nomads? Rat infestations aren't normally a problem with people who don't stay in one place.

They also did not touch the corpses of dead rats so the deadrat fleas didn't transfer nearly as often. So they were even more protected during the Black Death.

Of course, the enlightened Christains that were being decimated by the Plague saw that the Jews were largely healthy, assumed they were being protected by Satan, the Jews and their property was often burned for the sin of witchcraft.

Well actually the argument used to defend the Jews during that time was that they were dying as often as everyone else.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Weren't the early Hebrews nomads? Rat infestations aren't normally a problem with people who don't stay in one place.

you keep assuming they're rational. Leviticus always reads to me like someone with serious OCD. Either the author, or maybe his mother.

But where my cousin would freak if his mashed potatoes touched his vegetables, the Ancients claimed it was a sin for a kid to be boiled in its mother's milk.

 

[bilby]

In medieval Europe, one could no more avoid fleas than one could avoid air.

No matter what rules Jews followed, it is highly dubious, from an epidemiological point of view, that they would have had a lower rate of incidence of plague than anyone else of their socioeconomic status.

Insofar as Jews had lower rates of plague than the average, this would have been more the result of their wealth, than of their religious observances.

Medieval European Christians didn't need to see a difference in health outcomes for Jews as an excuse for a pogrom anyway. Whenever anything bad happened, the Jews got the blame.

 

[credoconsolans]

Weren't the early Hebrews nomads? Rat infestations aren't normally a problem with people who don't stay in one place.

you keep assuming they're rational. Leviticus always reads to me like someone with serious OCD. Either the author, or maybe his mother.

But where my cousin would freak if his mashed potatoes touched his vegetables, the Ancients claimed it was a sin for a kid to be boiled in its mother's milk.

Agree

In medieval Europe, one could no more avoid fleas than one could avoid air.

No matter what rules Jews followed, it is highly dubious, from an epidemiological point of view, that they would have had a lower rate of incidence of plague than anyone else of their socioeconomic status.

Insofar as Jews had lower rates of plague than the average, this would have been more the result of their wealth, than of their religious observances.

Medieval European Christians didn't need to see a difference in health outcomes for Jews as an excuse for a pogrom anyway. Whenever anything bad happened, the Jews got the blame.

And agree.

 

[skepticalbip]

Medieval European Christians didn't need to see a difference in health outcomes for Jews as an excuse for a pogrom anyway. Whenever anything bad happened, the Jews got the blame.

And yet my profs never accepted my excuse that "the fucking Jews stole my lab report" when I was late finishing it. I guess I was born way too late so didn't have medieval profs.

 

[Kharakov]

Medieval European Christians didn't need to see a difference in health outcomes for Jews as an excuse for a pogrom anyway. Whenever anything bad happened, the Jews got the blame.

And yet my profs never accepted my excuse that "the fucking Jews stole my lab report" when I was late finishing it. I guess I was born way too late so didn't have medieval profs.

That's why you go God's route: My son fell, and got juice (his blood) on the control panel. I'm still working on everything. Thanks for your patience, understanding, and continual efforts which never get in the way of what I'm trying to accomplish.