Harsh Truth: If Intelligent Design is Untestable . . .

[JM2C]

This is 10 years after Herod's death.

LK 2:2 This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.

“The first census”

AC 5:37 “After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the census and drew away some people after him; he too perished, and all those who followed him were scattered.

And this was the second census, ten years later.

 

[JM2C]

Look I don't always agree with Josephus' history, but he is far more reliable than Luke.

You would rather get a witness like Josephus, who is unreliable, so you can prove Luke is wrong. Do you watch law and order? If a witness is unreliable or lying against the accused most of the time the accused is acquitted.

 

[JM2C]

Josephus came from royal background from his mother's side and his father was a priest at the temple. Plus that Josephus have imperial connections with both Vepasian and son Titius - gave Josephus have unique position of being able to access both Jewish and Roman records or sources that Luke and Matthew wouldn't have access to.

Access to what? Why would Matthew, the apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, need access of the Jewish and Romans records when he was with the Lord Jesus during His earthly ministry? Matthew was walking with the Lord Jesus day-in day-out for over three years and you think he can’t remember anything that went on during those years that he needed the Jewish and Romans records to write the his gospel?

 

[JM2C]

*****

And Josephus made it quite clear when Judaea became a province and when Quirinius became governor and when the census took place.

From Josephus again.

LK 2:2 This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.

 

[JM2C]

And beside that, a Roman census would registered people where they lived, not by what tribe. If Joseph was living in Nazareth, then he would have enrol there, not in Bethlehem.

Genealogical records is very important in antiquity. Why do you think they say, the son of Zebedee? Because there is another James, the son of Alphaeus. People in antiquity can go back thousands of years to trace their ancestor just like from Abraham to the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 1:1-17 and this is by the tribe.

 

[JM2C]

And if Luke was indeed a physician and Paul's disciple from Antioch, then it is very doubtful that he witnessed Jesus' ministry, first hand.

Luke did NOT say he was an eyewitness. Luke compiled his book from eyewitnesses and from these eyewitnesses you should be able to understand that he did not copy Matthew’s, but amazingly they are all identical with Mark’s, and that’s why they called this synoptic gospels or “they see the same” or from the Greek syn (same) and optic (relating to sight or view). A lot people thought they copied each other’s account, but read Luke’s account here.

LK 1:1 Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us,
LK 1:2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word,
LK 1:3 it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus;
LK 1:4 so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.

Luke: “they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.”

This is the very reason why all these must be written during the first generation of Christianity, “the eyewitnesses and servants of the word” are still alive and could pass “the exact truth about the things you have been taught” on to the next generation.

What happen if nothing was written during the first generation Christianity and all of them died?

Everything from the next generation’s accounts would be nothing but hearsay, but God did not plan it that way, did He? So, any account different or does not harmonize with the NT did not come from the first generation’s accounts of Christianity, i.e., [Christ earthly ministry, His death, burial and resurrection] and therefore, all of them are nothing but hearsay.

 

[JM2C]

It is said that the gospel was written in late 70s or eary 80s, so it is also doubtful that he would have met Mary mother of Jesus, who supposedly died in 48 CE. If that's the case, where did the source(s) about Jesus' birth and Mary's pregnancy come from?


I have no doubt that Luke is wrong about the timeline of census and governorship of Quirinius.

The fact that there other sources other than Luke, that mean you haven't refuted anything I have written about this subject.

I suspect that you are going to ignore anything I write, since you are not interested in learning historical facts.

”Mary, who supposedly died in 48 AD” is a good example of hearsay. Read Luke 1:1-4 again.

 

[JM2C]

For instance, there seemed to only one behemoth made by God, supposedly the first creature, according to the first line of Job 40:19:

Behemoth is plural.
JOB 40:15 “Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you;
He eats grass like an ox.

The Behemoth and Man were created by God in the same day.

GE 1:25 God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
GE 1:26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
GE 1:27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

Job 40:19 said:

“It is the first of the great acts of God—
only its Maker can approach it with the sword.

Ok, so Job claimed that God made behemoth. But why would God only approach his own creation with a sword? Is it even dangerous to God? Why would God even need a weapon?

The Behemoth is so big that only God can control it, but God gave man dominion over them.
GE 1:26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

That’s maybe the reason why they don’t eat people back then. Only in movies dinosaurs eat people.

Your problem with similes is that you are not only taking them literally, but that it talk about how mug of the tail is "bendable", but YOU are making assumption that it is talking about the behemoth's height and size. You are jumping to wrong conclusion. The verse say one thing, but you seemed to think it mean something else.

Do you have natural tendency of changing the context of what the verses say?

You seemed to do the same thing with science. Even when you do quote some scientific article, you changed what it mean, or you don't include all the relevant text in the paragraph. To me that deceptive and very desperate act.

Interpreting it differently and inconsistently is the true meaning of “deceptive and very desperate act”.

 

[JM2C]

Usually, using simile like "run like the wind" means the person run fast. Usain Bolt was one of the fastest sprinters in the Olympics, so naturally one would assume that's what it mean by "run like the wind".


Homer, in both the Iliad and the Odyssey, often used simile, including "wind" with a person (like Achilles, Teucer, Odysseus, etc) as similes for fast runners.


The simile never used gentle breeze in comparison to people's running speed.

Suppose you go to a place where there is no or very little wind and you tell a story about Usain Bolt runs like the wind. People there might say: Oh, we walk faster than Usain then because the wind here is very slow. On the other hand if you go to Chicago, the windy city, and tell the same story about Usain Bolt, right away they would understand you.

IOW, you can’t interpret idiomatic expression from a different time frame with your own interpretation today because you don’t agree with it. Instead of learning from it you are pushing yourself away from it because you have your own interpretation.

I have a friend and at the age of 42 he finished his first Iron Man and the end of the race he cried like a baby. What an expression, right?

Now, can you somehow understand or replace that expression with you own expression? No, you can’t, for the simple reason that only this guy at that moment could understand this and expressed it the way he wanted it. You cannot interpret it your way until you do your first Iron Man and finish it.

 

[outhouse]

but read Luke’s account here.

NO luke wrote anything in that book

Your overstating your position yet again

 

[outhouse]

Behemoth and Man were created by God in the same day.

Unsubstantiated rhetoric that is mythology before scientific factual reality.


We factually evolved.

 

[outhouse]

Everything from the next generation’s accounts would be nothing but hearsay

That is all we have now.

You have no clue what was Johns teachings he taught jesus, and what Jesus actually taught. We will never know because these sources were all written by people far removed from any actual event.


Had you taken a single class on the NT you would know this. But its obvious your just spouting out apologetics you know little about.

 

[Parsimony]

In thermodynamics, order cannot be measure by number & kinds of parts.
It's about the number of possible states of those parts.
Entropy (order and disorder) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This whole concept of order is less useful than thinking in terms of energy available to do work.

I suppose you're right. The concept of order and complexity in everyday usage seems so finicky.

 

[gnostic]

Suppose you go to a place where there is no or very little wind and you tell a story about Usain Bolt runs like the wind. People there might say: Oh, we walk faster than Usain then because the wind here is very slow. On the other hand if you go to Chicago, the windy city, and tell the same story about Usain Bolt, right away they would understand you.

IOW, you can’t interpret idiomatic expression from a different time frame with your own interpretation today because you don’t agree with it. Instead of learning from it you are pushing yourself away from it because you have your own interpretation.

I have a friend and at the age of 42 he finished his first Iron Man and the end of the race he cried like a baby. What an expression, right?

Now, can you somehow understand or replace that expression with you own expression? No, you can’t, for the simple reason that only this guy at that moment could understand this and expressed it the way he wanted it. You cannot interpret it your way until you do your first Iron Man and finish it.

You are missing the whole point of simile as literary's figure of speech, JM2C.

Wind can be of any speed, that's true, but using the "wind" in connection with Bolt in a race, as a simile, often referred to Bolt running faster than other Olympians in a 100m sprint.

The use of similes are most common in verse literature, like poetry, for instance, epic poems of The Iliad, The Odyssey, or in Old Norse sagas.

Similes can often be commonly found in allegories, in religious scriptures.

My point with the example of Bolt "run like wind", means that he run faster than everyone else in foot races, but HE IS NOT THE "WIND".

I could write that "Samson is strong as a bear", and I mean to talk of Samson's "strength" being greater than any normal man. So using this saying or simile, it doesn't mean that I am saying Samson is a bear.

Do you understand what I am saying now?

In Job 40:17

17 It makes its tail stiff like a cedar;

17 He moveth his tail like a cedar

Both referred to the tail cedar, as either how much its tail bend or how stiff tail is. It doesn't say anything about the cedar height, so Job 40:17 is not talking about the tail's length. You are making wrong comparison between the behemoth and the cedar. What I am saying that your personal interpretation to 40:17 has deliberately changed the context of that verse, so that you can say that this behemoth is a dinosaur.

And judging by your past posts, you think this behemoth is T-Rex.

Behemoth is plural.
JOB 40:15 “Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you;
He eats grass like an ox.

Except that every time it referred to the behemoth, it always referred to it as "he" or "him" or "his" (from verse 17 to 24) - which are all singular, not plural like "they" or "them" or "their".

Again, you like to twist contexts to suit your baseless argument. Your dishonesty precede you.

The Behemoth and Man were created by God in the same day.

GE 1:25 God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
GE 1:26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
GE 1:27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

The Behemoth is so big that only God can control it, but God gave man dominion over them.
GE 1:26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

No where in Genesis 1:25-27 does it mention "behemoth". Again more, more dishonesty from you.

That’s maybe the reason why they don’t eat people back then. Only in movies dinosaurs eat people.

More straw man from you.

I have said anything about dinosaurs eating people.

I only say stated that tyrannosaurs were meat-eaters, meaning they were predators to other dinosaurs. I didn't say that they eat people.

You are right that dinosaurs don't eat people, and not because they are herbivores, but because dinosaurs were never around at any time in human history, BECAUSE they have been extinct since about 65 million years ago, at the end of Cretaceous period.

But they (dinosaurs) weren't around at any time of biblical stories, you being a YEC believe in all sort of ignorant things. You just believe in the Young Earth Creationism, and the YECs are known for their famous dishonesty. The behemoth is nothing more than mythological creature that you have delusionally associated with dinosaurs.

Just because you believe that behemoth and dinosaurs are one and the same, doesn't mean what you believe in or how you interpret Job 40 to be true or accurate.

Interpreting it differently and inconsistently is the true meaning of “deceptive and very desperate act”.

You keep telling yourself that. I just wonder how you can look yourself in the mirror in the morning.

I have nothing but you not only corrupting science for your creationism, but you have corrupted the bible with your own warped interpretations.

 

[McBell]

Genealogical records is very important in antiquity.

To bad they are not accurate nor reliable...

 

[gnostic]

Genealogical records is very important in antiquity. Why do you think they say, the son of Zebedee? Because there is another James, the son of Alphaeus. People in antiquity can go back thousands of years to trace their ancestor just like from Abraham to the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 1:1-17 and this is by the tribe.

To bad they are not accurate nor reliable...

Yes. More often than not, they are invented, to make someone more important than they are.

Alexander the Great traced his lineage back to Neoptolemus, son of Achilles and grandson of Peleus and the sea goddess Thetis. And Peleus himself was a grandson of Zeus.

Julius Caesar traced his to Iulus, hence the Julian family, and Iulus was supposedly the son of the Trojan hero Aeneas, who was the son of love goddess Venus.

And many ancient cities all along the Mediterranean, of coastal Europe, Asia and Africa, often say they come from the Heracles (Hercules).

Does JM2C know how many European royal families, especially in the British isles trace their lines all the way to King Arthur?

I used to get quite a number of emails from people who visited Timeless Myths, wanted me to trace their ancestries back to King Arthur or to one of knights of the round table.

You're right, Mestemia, genealogies are hardly reliable, especially when people seeking to elevate ancestry to great men or families.

Our family name is Chau, which are variations to Chou or Zhou, so if I wanted to waste my times, I could meaninglessly seek out my link to "royalty", to the Zhou dynasty in feudal China of the 1st millennium BCE. Sorry, but I don't have that sort of vainty of myself.

And the genealogies presented in 2 gospels are contradictory, therefore as unreliable as you get.

So JM2C can toots Jesus' horn all he want, but I don't think anyone here believe much what he say, because he have the tendencies to twist anything and everything he like.

 

[Revoltingest]

I suppose you're right. The concept of order and complexity in everyday usage seems so finicky.

Aye, it's best avoided because of the confusion.

 

[JM2C]

That's not necessarily true. Entropy can also be view as a reduction of available potential energy to do work. A rock sitting on a cliff has more gravitational potential energy than the same rock would have if it was sitting in the valley below. However, both situations are equally complex (since they have the same number and kinds of parts).

Potential energy due to its height, “sitting on a cliff”, and as it drops it gains speed and kinetic energy while the potential energy is decreasing or losing. Energy used energy lost. Entropy! 2nd LoT. As the rock drops, gaining kinetic energy, but losing potential energy entropy is increasing and therefore creates disorder and chaos or death to this energy.

The rock sitting in the valley below can never gain any gravitational potential energy anymore or at all since it’s not going anywhere. Where do we see this as an example? Water Dams

Let me ask you. Let’s supposed we have two rocks sitting on a cliff, but one is higher by 5 meters, and they drop one second apart and hit the earth at the same time, What is your conclusion?

 

[JM2C]

You are generalising.

I did not say ALL dinosaurs were all meat-eaters.

I said that tyrannosaur-rex were meat eaters, they didn't "eat grass like ox", like Job's behemoth in Job 40.

I had stated that some were carnivores, more were herbivores, but very few were omnivores (can eat meat inane plants).

When we were arguing earlier, it would seem that you were linking the Job's behemoth to the tyrannosaur rex. My counter-argument were stated that T-rex were never plant-eater (ie not herbivores), so the the t-rex couldn't be behemoth, because they didn't eat grass.

For some reasons or another, you argue that I was wrong about the tyrannosaur rex, that they could eat grass, like ox.

Your argument began with countering my argument later about me saying that Job (book) was full of non-scientific superstitions (post 1315), when you linked behemoth to dinosaurs (post 1319):


But all paleobiologists and paleozoologists have cleared stated that the tyrannosaur rex were carnivorous dinosaurs, and it is not because of the movie Jurassic Park.
gnostic said:↑
Job 38 and 40 just showed utterly uneducated God and the author are. It showed God as superstitious as Job and the author.
JM2C said:↑
”uneducated God” WOW!

Speaking of Job 40:15 “Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you; He eats grass like an ox.,

“BEHEMOTH”, the DINOSAUR species? Yes! And the “LEVIATHAN” in Job 41:1, Job 3:8 and Psalm 104:26 known as the sea monsters.

You just gave us more proof from Job that human were living contemporaneously with dinosaurs and the leviathans.

Now, tell me who is the “uneducated” here, you, who provided this evidence against evolutionist, or God? You should have kept your thoughts with you.
Click to expand...
Then in your next post (1320), you wanted to know why Dr Horner refused to C14 date soft tissues of T-rex:
JM2C said:↑
When Dr. Horner was asked if he could carbon-14 test the T-Rex soft tissue discovered by Mary Schweitzer in 1993, why did he refuse? Was he concern about what might be the outcome of the test? You should do a research on this and find out yourself and you will be surprise that those millions and billions of years were nothing but lies.

“He was concerned about the “spin” that creationists might put on such a result and that a radiometric dating result in thousands of years “is not going to help us.” By helping us, he means those of the evolutionary faithful. He is absolutely correct with regard to his concerns. The evidence of dinosaurs that date back to the biblical story of creation in the book of Genesis would be a tragedy for those who are hanging their hats, not to mention their professional reputations, on the Darwinian assumption of deep time.”
Click to expand...
You quoted Job several times, about the behemoth's tail and sinews of the thighs or femurs, before linking the sinews and tail that of T-rex in comparison with that of Job's behemoth, like post 1336 and 1340:
JM2C said:↑
”Religious rhetoric” is not in any way related to the description itself? Where do you think this rhetoric came from? Try this verse JOB 40:15 “Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you; He eats grass like an ox.

There wouldn’t be any rhetoric or any narrative at all if there was no “BEHEMOTH” that God created.




JOB 40:17 “He bends his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are knit together.


Cedar can grow up to 130 feet and that is just the tail of this Behemoth.
Click to expand...
JM2C said:↑
If I describe an elephant I would probably use a tree to describe the height. I did not say 130 feet but it can grow up to 130 feet.

JOB 40:17 “He bends his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are knit together.

Cedar can grow up to 130 feet and that is just the tail of this Behemoth.

Atendon(orsinew) is a tough band offibrous connective tissuethat usually connectsmuscletobone[1]and is capable of withstandingtension. Tendons are similar toligamentsandfasciae; all three are made ofcollagen.

“The sinews of his thighs are knit together.” The T-rex’s femur or thigh is where they found the tissue or collagen/sinew. Do you think this is just a coincidence, or it’s God’s work?
Click to expand...
Post 1340 (above) is when directly linked behemoth and T-Rex together.


Emergence argued that T-Rex don't eat grass (1341), as did I in post 1353:
gnostic said:↑
You are the one who brought up behemoth in Job 40. And you are the one who brought up t-rex.


It would seem to me that you are linking behemoth to Tyrannosaurus rex.

T-rex is carnivore dinosaurs. They wouldn't eat grass, because they are meat eaters.

Tyrannosaurus rex is indeed a dinosaur, but not all dinosaurs are Tyrannosaurus rex.

You don't know anything about dinosaurs, and it would seem that you don't know what a Tyrannosaurus rex is, nor know what they eat.

Again, it would seem that your own education is seriously lacking. You don't know much about T-rex, and you don't know what they eat. One thing is certain, T-rex don't eat grass, because plants are not part of their diet.
Click to expand...
You did just link any species of dinosaurs to behemoth, you linked the t-Rex to behemoth.

Not all dinosaurs are tyrannosaurus, and not all dinosaurs were plant-eaters, but you dismissed my point, as if all dinosaurs were the same, and have the same diet as your bloody behemoth.

Who’s on first? You are confusing yourself. Chronological timeline is very important here.

According to the bible, the Behemoth, [by mistake I wrote mammoth] were the first creation of God along with man, “Behold now, Behemoth, which I made as well as you” and it says “he eats grass like an ox” meaning they were not meat eaters in the beginning but actually plant eaters. How they became meat eaters? No one knows, do you?
Here is the proof that they were plant eaters.
GE 1:30 and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food”; and it was so.

 

[JM2C]

To bad they are not accurate nor reliable...

Not according to this guy

Strange, my family can be traced back over 500 years and in a patchy way up to 1000 years ago when the family name first arrived in the UK. Maybe the difference is that some people (i.e. my father and his cousins) are willing to make a serious effort while others just like to meander along celebrating ignorance.