Evil
Just when you think you've seen the lowest depths to which the human animal can descend, somebody has to go and prove you wrong.
posted by Jar(egg)head at 09:02
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
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3 Comments:
An article listed on the same page as the subject article discusses a Florida State professor theory that Jesus may have walked on ice rather than water as per the biblical account. Some years prior he had a theory that natural conditions may explain the parting of the Red sea for the Israelites. The article seems to indicate that he is not trying to disprove that Jesus or God are omnipotent powerful beings, but simply trying to explain little subparts of the ancient writings as being natural phenomenon. This is amusing since there are really only two ways to view this stuff. 1. You believe and have faith that these beings are powerful enough to perform these miracles or 2. you believe that the ancient texts are full of exaggeration and, dare I say, lies and fabrications, and at a minimum there are scientific explanations for some of the observed and recorded events surrounding these beings. Either you believe these beings are omnipotent gods that can perform all kind of miracles, or you believe it's all a farce. Not much in-between. It's almost like accepting that in a mmorpg like Everquest (EQ) that a druid has been given the ability to stop the rain in a zone by the programmers as one of many magical or super natural acts performed daily in EQ, but then wanting to debate that its impossible for a fully plate armored warrior to swim the ocean of tears without sinking. Therefore, he must be running on a piece of ice just under the surface or maybe his armor has air pockets in it that keep him afloat while just under the surface is a huge tightly packed school of fish that he's treading on when he runs out of gas for those air pockets.
You're making a somewhat ontological argument, but I agree with you in principle. Dissecting a faith-based document like the Christian Bible with science--especially if you're going to leverage your conclusions as a negative "proof" against believers--is little more than mental masturbation. It's just as silly, in fact, as believers of that same faith trying to handpick selected pieces of science out of context as "proof" of intelligent design.
Bluntly, science and faith cannot reside in the same house. They are antithetical; no amount of expostulation--on either side--can bring about any meaningful reconciliation. It's far better for believers to say "I believe," and then stop. Likewise, scientifically-oriented atheists such as myself say "I do not believe."
And then I stop.
Wow from the dudes stealing gifts for sick children to the raging debate on faith vs. science. I think Carl Sagan said it best, "We just don't know."
So read the ancient texts and the scientific theories and decide for yourself.
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