There is no philosophical, logical or theological reason why it can't; although the more we learn about the Universe and all in it, the harder it is to credit to any supernatural deity without wanting to ask a very simple but very awkward question about that deity.
Understanding the natural sciences requires thought and effort.
Biblical literalism requires neither, and indeed suppresses both to such an extent that if I were religious I would accuse it of insulting not only my intelligence as audience, but even its own deity.
There is no reason you can't believe in God but still learn and admire what science reveals, because religion tries to ask Why and By Whom, For Whom; whereas science asks How and When. Indeed, the more we learn of it, the more majestic and beautiful that creation and its processes - including evolution - become.
The most prominent argument against your question is the Bible itself (or the Quran, for that matter)
Evolution of species is not part of the Creation/Intelligent Design paradigm, if one is to take the Book of Genesis at it’s word. The “world” (the sun, moon, stars, waters, and ‘firmament’) was supposedly “made“ in 6 DAYS; no matter how one extrapolates that measure, it falls far short of the hundreds of millions of years life has evolved on the earth, or the billions of years the sun has shone upon it, and the moon has circled around it.
This post was edited by Don Barzini at October 1, 2018 3:47 AM MDT
Thank you for your reply DB and Happy Monday to thee. Your response supposes that the BIBLE is the word of God. You do know it was written by many men over many years and that there were political reasons for why some "books" were included and some were excluded. You must also be aware of the gathering of men to decide what they wanted the Bible to look like and these various councils were held to determine that. All men. So I do not accept that it is THE WORD OF GOD. I shall be pilloried for that but it matters not. It's what I believe based on the historical records of who and when and what and why the Bible we have today is the Bible we have today. There are different versions. All written by men. I guess I beat that horse to the death. I shall ask a question about. The Nicene Creed. The Nicene Council. Ring a bell?
This post was edited by RosieG at October 1, 2018 3:54 AM MDT
As an unabashed Atheist, I could not agree with you more. The Bible’s many fallacies and ignominious origins are no mystery to me. If we’re going there, let’s not forget that not one word of the New Testament was written by anyone who was present at the events they describe. That the present form(s) of the book are copies of copies of copies, imprecisely retranslated dozens of times. I am aware and well-versed on the two Councils at Nicea, in 376 & 776, at which Christian doctrines were decided, redacted and cobbled together. If there is a God, he might be duly ashamed of the obvious fictions attributed to his hand.
This post was edited by Don Barzini at October 1, 2018 6:22 AM MDT
I do believe in a supreme something else above and beyond because I was trained to do so as a child. But there is no church I attend and while I do have a bible I was given at Sunday School in 1948 (it is held together with a rubber band. It was a very inexpensive bible) I do not go to it as a source of anything because I know it is a politically based compendium of what me thought and wanted over the centuries putting forth a guide to control people into doing what they wanted them to do. There are books featiring women that were eliminated. Male dominance has asserted itself since forever and I seriously doubt that will ever change. Thank you for your reply DB.
I was so trained too, in a fairly light-handed manner - but I started to question the notion of supernatural deities before I was twelve, and once I realised Christianity has no monopoly on religious belief, realised the whole kit and caboodle was based on using something utterly improvable either way, an excuse for social control.
I admit religious belief can bring comfort to people, and most religions ever known (and probably those long-dead and forgotten) have attempted to invent a belief in some sort of after-life as a form of what we would now call 'bereavement counselling'. I also have a number of friends who are church-goers, and recently I attended by invitation the ordination of one as an Anglican deacon! Nevertheless, I reject being told to believe in a god when a child means you have to as an adult, and indeed in that spirit I do agree with your observations on the control element, which religion seems to attract more than any other social norm or ideology.
Some folks depend on religion, some on alcohol, some on drugs, some on sex, some on shopping, some on making money, some on other activities to get through life Durdle. Who is to say which of these is more destructive instructive constructive? I think there is no harm is "believing in or using" anything to ease the journey in life that we all take providing it harms no one in any way including the purveyor thereof. Why does it matter to anyone if I believe in a "God" or supreme being or power above and beyond our knowledge? How does it affect or impact their lives either positively or negatively? I think it's silly to look down on folks for their beliefs and also counterproductive if you're interested in talking to all kinds of folks with all kinds of views. If you know someone who thinks he/she is superior to you just because that someone does not believe in a supreme power and you do how is that a helpful thing? Seriously? I find disbelievers are too often disdainful and contemptuous of those who believe. I guess it cuts both ways although I find less intellectual arrogance directed toward non-believers by believers. That could simply be my limited experiences and observations. I think many Atheists are far better "Christians" than the self-proclaimed true believers. Why? How we treat one another is what matters. Not what we believe. How we treat one another. I am not a complicated person. I don't always understand everything. But I have no problem with those who don't share my beliefs. They sometimes have a problem with me. So be it! Thank you for your reply and Happy Friday! :)
God created life. Science tells us that life does not come from nonlife. God created that life. There is debate of the original meaning of "day" in Genesis. Many believe it could mean longer period of time. Personally, I believe Genesis to be the re-creation/remodeling of Earth.
The Bible is not a science book but when it touches on science it is accurate.
I'm not sure how you square that circle. I've no bother about people believing some supernatural being created and operates the universe, but religion and science ask two fundamentally different things.
Religions try to ask By Whom, Why and For Whom - apart from the given faith's own deity satisfying itself of course. Religions have come and gone since time immemorial, the Three Abrahamic faiths have no monopoly on it despite them arguing that very point between themselves; but that first set of questions pretty much sums up all religions.
Science works on debate, hypothesis, question, test, revision - all the while eliciting ever more closely the answers to the How? questions. They do not ask How, let alone such details as How Long It Took, etc.
Science asks, How, including how long, from what materials and starting-points, and so son.
Religion, or at least the blind-faith versions, and Science also work in opposite ways. Religion tries to stifle debate: if the idea is in the Bible / Talmud / Quran / Classical Greek pantheon, it must be right merely by existing there, and thou shalt not question or test it. At its worst it degenerates into the intellectual and theological dead-end of scriptural literalism, whose main purpose in modern life is more often as a means of suppression of people, rather than a way of celebrating its own deity's works. If anything it unwittingly demeans that very deity and its creations, by rejecting what Science shows really happened, and happens, in them.
Irrespective of any god having created life in general, Science DOES tell us life came from non-life: EVERYTHING in the universe, living or non-living, is made up from the chemical elements, none of which on their own are not living in any sense. How it did so is still very unclear, but life didn't just appear thanks to some deity waving a magic pair of dividers. There's nothing wrong in believing some deity drove the requisite processes over the vast spans of time and distance needed if it brings personal comfort to do so; but you can't throw away knowledge just to suit a few Bronze Age scribes who genuinely lacked that knowledge. Scribes whom I am sure if they could come back now and see what we have already learnt in astronomy, geology and biology, would stand in awe but embrace all that How as still part of God's work, not reject it because the Genesis myth was all mere humans could manage 3000 years ago.
The Genesis myth has God making the Earth, along with everything else, from scratch; not re-building it from something else! As you say, the Bible is not a science book, and it does not try to be as there was no science in its own time and place. It makes no attempt to explain how its god did it all; about the only thing in its favour is that the unknown men who invented that Creation story we see now as absurd, at least tried to be logical rather than merely trotting out an even more absurd fairy-story, as was common to many early religions. That does NOT mean they were right, but that's not their fault, as they genuinely had no prior scientific knowledge, nor ways to obtain that knowledge.
We cannot know what they meant by "day" - obviously it is not literally true with our centuries of hindsight; but more importantly is whether they meant it literally from genuine ignorance, or metaphorically to help transmit their theological ideas to a largely-uneducated congregation in a theocratic, paternal, tribal society. We will never know. We don't even know anything about the writers other than being members of those ancient Hebrew tribes, nor the sources of their ideas, which may well have been cobbled together from older religions' notions.
Religions is all very well as personal comfort, but is not and should not be used as, a substitute for investigation, analysis and learning; and certainly not to close down rational debate on the How question, nor to control others.
Durdle 