Fine tuning in the universe and now biology how interesting

What point am I ignoring?  That you said, you can't *purposely* deny Scripture and be a Christian?  No, I'm not ignoring it, I just don't see how it is relevant to the issue at hand, because Christians who believe the universe is billions of years do NOT *purposefully* deny Scripture but *sincerely* believe that there is no conflict with Scripture.  

If that was your point, then I have addressed it.  Can we now get back to your original point?

YOU made the claim that belief in evolution or billions of years is the result of a spiritual issue of God vs. Atheist/Anti-God.  I said your dichotomy is a false one because there are "hundreds upon hundreds of Christians in the world" who also accept evolution and billions of years.  You said, "There are not" and followed with a lengthy post on "cultural Christianity" which seemed to say or at least strongly imply--without clearly saying--that Christians who believe in evolution and/or billions of years aren't or can't really be Christians.

*Now, is it really too much for me to ask you if you could please clarify your position on this?

When I said there are many Christians who accept evolution and billions of years and you responded "There are not," what did you mean by that?  Did you mean that you don't believe that there are any Christians who actually believe this way, or that you don't believe a person can believe evolution or billions of years and still be a Christian?  Or, did you mean something else entirely?

I think I clearly said I don’t believe that a person can believe in evolution and be a Christian. I also think I was clear with my point that a person who claims to be a Christian and claims the Bible is incorrect in not a believer. Each time I say it you ask me again if it’s what I mean. I don’t know what else to say to you.

Thank you for clarifying.  I guess I just don't understand, then, why you didn't just come out and say that yes, you do, in fact, believe that evolution and the age of the universe are essential faith-issues and "deal-breakers" when it comes to salvation, but OK.  Most Christians would disagree, and your view is definitely at odds with orthodox Christian teaching on soteriology, but hey, that's your perogative.  Moving on then...

Can I ask what your religious background is?

Christian

Of what denomination have you been associated with. Please don’t be obtuse, there’s no reason to hide who you are or where you’ve been. If you don’t want me to know just say so.

Not being obtuse, and have no problem sharing.  Mine is simply a long backstory that may not be of interest to people.

Actually that's a perfectly fair observation but it was one o'clock in the morning, I needed to turn in & that throw-away line was an impatient reaction to a comment in a previous post (#56):-

"you cannot purposely deny what Scripture says" - I felt that needed rebutting immediately.

Of course there are many factual things to be found in the Old Testament such as the reign of certain kings (established historical figures), historical events & so on. So to say that there's nothing of a factual nature in scripture is not accurate.

But many more statements of a propositional kind, that the first man was made froma handful of dust, the first woman from his rib, that 'God' spoke from a burning bush, these things either need to be dismissed given modern knowledge or set to one side. That bar by which we judge some claim to be true is rarely reached in so much of what's stated as fact in the OT.

So I should probably have thought for a little longer & written:-

Much that scripture relates as 'fact' is merely what some people in the late Bronze-Age believed as fact. It doesn't necessarily lead us to believe the same.

   Tbwp10, this post of Stephen’s is an example of the type of belief that the Scriptures say an actual child of God cannot posses. An understanding of what the Scriptures are teaching coupled with a rejection of that teaching.

   And though I’ve written it seemingly a thousand times, maybe I failed to make a certain point clear in this thread. That point is that the Bible is throughout so clear on the six day creation that a person could not honestly make the assumption that a six thousand year creation or 13,000,000,000,000 year creation is what the Scriptures teach. Maybe me not stating these two points together is the source of our talking past each other.

   And just to restate another point that I have made in this thread, I am not talking about someone who is making an honest mistake in their reading of Scripture. When I was a child my parents sent me on a church bus (I don’t know if you have this in Poland, but here many churches will purchase old school busses and paint them a different color [all our school busses are safety yellow] and send them through neighborhoods to pick up children and take them to church for a few hours) to a fundamentalist Baptist church where I was taught the Scriptural teaching of Creation. I believed it was true. I was a public school student and was of course taught the theory of evolution and told it was true, and I believed that also. As silly as that sounds, I held both beliefs for a couple of reasons...1) it hadn’t occurred to me yet that they were contradictory, because...2) I just hadn’t thought about them both at the same time.

   When I realized that both the Scripture doctrine of Creation and the theory of evolution were not both true, I chose the Scripture. I was 21 years old at this time.

   And so I acknowledge that a person can be confused on some Biblical doctrines and still be a child of God, and that includes Creation. I do not say a person can misunderstand any Scriptural doctrine, there are heresies and then there are damnable heresies. Stephen just unwittingly gave me an excellent example of what I’m talking about, that is someone who does understand the teaching as being Scriptural, and yet for whatever reason rejects it.

   And so to return to your oft asked question, do I believe a person who believes in evolution cannot be a Christian, can not be a child of God, is going to Hell (however you want to phrase it), my answer is that yes, if he sees that it is the clear teaching of Scripture and purposely rejects it, it points to an unregenerate heart and so yes, in that case that is exactly what I am saying. You cannot be a believer and an unbeliever at the same time. You can be a believer and ignorant at the same time.

   Maybe inserting my answer into the middle of your thought will make my point more clear.

And here’s yet another way for me to restate my answer.... belief in a six day creation is not an essential  doctrine for salvation, belief in the Word of God as contained in the Scriptures is.

@Kjvav  Thank you again for clarifying.  I feel the need to repeat myself as well and expound further.  First, as I told you on another thread, arguments based on the Bible are all well and good for Christians, but to non-Christians in this forum who don't believe in the Bible they are meaningless and unconvincing.  It's like showing up to a football game with an ice hockey rule book and insisting people follow it.  It's not going to happen so it is ultimately an ineffective approach that will persuade nobody.   Right or wrong, and like it or not, the "rule book" that skeptics follow in this "Evolution Discussion" forum are the rules of logic, science, and rational inquiry.  So, in order to have a meaningful dialogue with skeptics in this forum, you will still need to find a way to speak the scientific "language" and play by the "rules" of the science, even if it is subpar compared to divine revelation, because they don't speak that "language" or follow that "rule book."

For the same reason, our current conversation, while of interest to us is probably of limited to others, so we should probably be sensitive to that.  If, however, such a dialogue ultimately brings us to a better understanding, then it may still be worth pursuing, so I'm willing to see where this goes.

That said, I think we first need to be extremely clear on the following point: The Bible is obviously very important to Christianity, but the Bible does not actually require anyone to hold any particular view or belief about the Bible in order to be saved.  So, while it may seem strange and even counterintuitive, it is nevertheless still theoretically possible to encounter a Christian who believes one or more parts of the Bible are not true (*or, a Christian who believes that the original biblical manuscripts are 100% true and accurate, while the copies and translations of them are not).

I, in fact, have encountered such Christians.  The ones that come to mind happen to be Bible scholars I know, who believe the Bible is not 100% accurate, but still profess "Jesus as Lord" and accept his atoning death and resurrection based on historical evidence and historical accounts that do exist in the Bible. 

While many Christians (including other Bible scholars) may vehemently disagree with such an approach, see it as "less-Christian," and perhaps even borderline (or actual) heresy, the Bible is nevertheless still extremely clear that salvation comes through faith/belief in a Person ("Christ crucified"), and not "The Book" (i.e., Bible) written about that Person (and which didn't even exist during the lifetime of that Person).

You have also said as much in a previous post.  So, again, I think it's important to first be extremely clear about this: that while, yes, the Bible is obviously of great import and sacred to Christianity, that the Bible itself does not actually teach that one must believe in the Bible in order to be saved.  And while it may intuitively seem or feel that such a belief should be an obvious given to Christians, it still doesn't change the fact that the Bible does not require one to "believe" in the Bible---but in a Person---in order to be saved.  

Now, I know the idea of a Christian who thinks the Bible is not 100% error free will really rub you the wrong way and that you will find it unconscionable, but based on your prior posts, if you step back and really hear what it is that I am (and am not) claiming, then I think we will find ourselves in agreement on this point.

Where in the Bible does it say that one must believe in the Bible/Scripture to be saved?  If you already told me and I missed it I apologize.  I did go back through all your posts but did not see any clear statement from the Bible on this.  Is the John 8:47 quote you posted one of the verses that you think teaches this (it seemed so, but I wasn't entirely sure).  I'm willing to listen and consider your arguments.  Where in the Bible does it say this?

Looking forward to your input.

Gimme a bit, it’s Sunday and we’re heading to church

Modern science has built-in blinders; by blinders, I mean it has limited itself to only what can be seen and handled in the material world within our time. This limits all explanations for everything to only those found in the material and the amount of time we acknowledge. Once we start running into, or better said, recognizing some answers are not be found within these limitations, we can do but two things, in my opinion. Assume by blind faith in science; the answers will someday come, or acknowledging some answers may transcend our material world and never be found in the material world. 

I don't think it is a god of gaps where we see that God makes more sense than crediting a grant; (nothing) did it. Filling in the gaps we cannot explain with; I don't know so a god did it, would be a god of the gaps! However, looking at what we see, specified functional complexity in the universe and living systems, these are things we see and understand them. Not by what we do not know, instead of by what we already know and recognize when we see it. When we see these types of things can be found while looking at what a mind can do, that isn't filling in gaps with what we don't know, but an acknowledgment of what we do know! That is a very distinct difference. All of this, to me, speaks to more of an agency laying out everything with exacting detail in the function of the universe, and biological systems, than a fortunate set of unending specific features acting in concert for both a universe that supports life and life itself.

@TruthMuse  The article you posted challenges or at least raises some questions about the sufficiency of Neo-Darwinian (random) mutation-selection theory to account for evolutionary change, but I must again stress that it still in no way challenges the evidence for common ancestry and that evolution has occurred.  For example, we can study gene (and whole genome) evolution over time, and determine how organisms acquire new genetic material horizontally (from extraneous sources and other organisms) and vertically (by descent).  We can see see how genetic material is acquired and inherited and from where, and see how genomes in organisms change over time.  When we do so we see that animals and plants contain unique genes as well as genes that they have acquired from bacteria, and protozoa and viruses, and other organisms.  At most, the paper questions whether there was enough time for random mutation-selection to produce these genetic changes, but it in no way challenges the evidence that these genetic changes have, in fact, actually occurred.  So, if the conclusions are valid, then, at most it would be evidence that EVOLUTION was "intelligently designed" and directed.

But a major problem with even this conclusion is that mutation-selection is not the only mechanism by which evolution occurs.  You and I have already discussed this at length and I have posted articles for you about this as well.  Such, as this one about how Nothing in Evolution Makes Sense Except in the Light of Genomics: Read–Write Genome Evolution as an Active Biological Process, which nicely summarizes the many changes that have occurred in our understanding of evolution with the following:

"Combinatorial coding, plus the biochemical abilities cells possess to rearrange DNA molecules, constitute a powerful toolbox for adaptive genome rewriting. That is, cells possess “Read–Write Genomes” they alter by numerous biochemical processes capable of rapidly restructuring cellular DNA molecules. Rather than viewing genome evolution as a series of accidental modifications, we can now study it as a complex biological process of active self-modification."

So, once again, I must remind you that it is no longer accurate to view evolution as simply a random, "undirected," or even accidental process.   We now have mountains of evidence from molecular biology and genomics that tell us differently.  Living organisms have built-in mechanisms that allow them to actively modify their genomes, and also control where in the genome these modifications occur and to what frequency.  More and more we are discovering that random, "accidental" mutations are under biologic and genetic control (such as the bacteria stress response we've previously talked about, where in response to starvation/limited resources, bacteria purposely switch to low-fidelity replicating enzymes to increase the rate of mutation in their genomes, and thereby increase their survivability chances).

*But the article does not address and account for these new discoveries.  It simply focuses on old-school Neo-Darwinian mutation-selection theory.  So, it does not actually pose a challenge to our current understanding of evolutionary biology.

*HOWEVER, when it comes to the initial ORIGIN of these mechanisms and the ORIGIN OF LIFE, it is fair to say (despite optimistic popular science news articles to the contrary) that our current science does not adequately explain this.  The reductionistic approach to biology is increasingly recognized as a failed one.  We thought we could simply reduce life down to its parts and discover a naturalistic, mechanistic explanation for life.   We expected cell cytoplasm to be little different from the chemistry of seawater and for "simple" cells to be little different from oil droplets and just as easy to make.  We discovered this was entirely wrong.  There is an immense, enormous gulf between the living and non-living world.  Chemistry in living things is dramatically different from "normal," inorganic chemistry.  HP Yockey summarized it well:

"There is nothing in the physico-chemical world that remotely resembles reactions being determined by a sequence and codes between sequences."

Life cannot simply be reduced to chemistry, because among other things cells are not just chemistry but computational, information processing entities.  Paul Davies' 2002 description of this problem still applies when he wrote:

"Instead, the living cell is best thought of as a supercomputer - an information processing and replicating system of astonishing complexity. DNA is not a special life-giving molecule, but a genetic databank that transmits its information using a mathematical code. Most of the workings of the cell are best described, not in terms of material stuff - hardware - but as information, or software. Trying to make life by mixing chemicals in a test tube is like soldering switches and wires in an attempt to produce Windows 98. It won't work because it addresses the problem at the wrong conceptual level"

*A lot of chemistry occurs in cells, but also information processing, where chemicals don't behave as chemicals, per se, but as representational, arbitrary token symbols that comprise an equally arbitrary (genetic) code.  The top-down control (but still self-referentially regulated) processing of linear, digital information that occurs in living cells and that in turn cybernetically (i.e., "steers") directs a networked array of analog-type enzyme-mediated metabolic reactions is as mind-boggling as it is unexpected.  How to derive such exquisite, high-fidelity processes in the form of an autopoietic entity (that is it's own "cause and effect") and maintained far from equilibrium, from the non-informationally controlled, reactions that occur in "normal" inorganic chemistry and that are invariably driven toward equilibrium states---is a HUGE problem that remains unsolved, and for which our current scientific understanding cannot provide a competent, naturalistic/mechanistic answer.

@TruthMuse  Just saw/read your 2 posts.  Contact- great movie, and yes, I remember you posting the Peltzer video on the other thread and did watch it (very interesting).  Like all epistemologies, science too has its limitations--Agreed.  God-of-the-gaps is an issue of once bitten twice shy (*scientists are leery of divine explanations for unexplained phenomena cuz historically naturalistic causes are almost always found).  Science by definition can, of course, never posit supernatural causation, so at most can say we don't know/don't have naturalistic explanation.  Science can't explain everything--Agreed.  Philosophy, however, can entertain supernatural vs. natural causation.

*Speaking of which (on the philosophical side) it seems that even strict metaphysical naturalists would have to admit that NOT all of our known, observable universe is entirely physical.  For example, I find it intriguing that the physical constants of our universe (that, yes, appear to be "fine-tuned"--Agreed) and the related natural/physical "laws" of the universe are themselves, NOT physical, but abstract formalisms.  I'm not a professional philosopher so I can't comment in depth, but from my limited understanding this would seem problematic for the die-hard materialist/naturalist to explain.