Christianity

[Watt-Zeefuik]

So if there are parts of the bible you accept as being myths, how do you choose which parts you believe in?

 

What makes you think that the concept of God himself isn't also a myth?

 

2000+ years of Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and secular scholarship?  Critical thought?  When it's bleedingly obvious?

 

Okay, that last one isn't quite fair, as alfajambo points out, lots of scholars disagree with whether it's "obvious."  It's obvious that no one was around to record God creating the heavens and the earth, so the question there is whether God divinely dictated to Moses the first five books of the Bible to be passed on, as certain sects of Orthodox Jews believe, and which has been adopted by some Christians.  So you can either believe that, or you can believe something closer to the Documentary Hypothesis, that they're ancient texts that were composed and edited by multiple people over history, and that the recording of them in writing was an event that happened after the Babylonian captivity at the insistence of the Persian imperial government.  (I suppose you could also believe, as i8hibsh has suggested, that it was all invented like 500 years ago, but I'd say there's overwhelming empirical evidence against that.)  To me, the early chapters of Genesis make a whole lot more sense as the recording of ancient myths that were composed and modified to teach lessons within a particular culture than as Moses taking time out of his schedule to dutifully write down God's dictation word-for-word, and the whole "this is God's word" thing as a kind of cultural understanding to preserve the language in-tact without every would-be theologian coming along and deciding it needs another edit, but others disagree.  You believe what makes sense to you.

 

So there's sects of Christianity that think that every word of the Bible is the literal and inerrant Word of God.  I disagree, partially because I simply don't have the capacity to believe in a God whose literal and inerrant word is that contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing.  I *can* believe that the Bible is written by humans, and that humans are generally contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing, but that occasionally we try to set their eyes on something more noble, eternal, and righteous than ourselves, and it's worth paying attention to those places throughout history where people have tried to do this.  As my cousin eloquently puts it, God is a mystery.  No human in history (even including Jesus during his time incarnate as human, canonically Mat 24:36) can comprehend that mystery fully, but we can get snippets of it, and we try to point to the mystery.

 

The answer to your last question is really long, and I'm guessing you don't really care about the full answer.  The short, short, short version is that sometimes I do think God is a myth, but my life seems to be better and I like myself better when I behave as if God isn't a myth.  Hence "belief" is more of an action than a state of mind.  I'm incapable of knowing for sure one way or the other.

[Fourcandles]

Though I'm an atheist I can see that Christianity is useful to some people.

I actually like the atonosphere in church, the singing, the stained glass windows, the people of goodwill it usually seems to attract, the comfort and community factors too.

 

However the Utilitarian argument adds nothing to the whether it's true or not and that's for me the stumbling block. I used to be a believer, a Sunday school teacher in fact, but later in life, I'm 57, I started thinking too much about it and listening to both sides of the whether it's TRUE debate.

 

Ultimately the conflict with scientific, rather than anthropocentiric facts, just doesn't bear out.

It's good to debate it though and this thread with the exception of one fundamentalist/biblical literalist has been a really good thread.

 

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[Watt-Zeefuik]

Though I'm an atheist I can see that Christianity is useful to some people.

I actually like the atonosphere in church, the singing, the stained glass windows, the people of goodwill it usually seems to attract, the comfort and community factors too.

 

However the Utilitarian argument adds nothing to the whether it's true or not and that's for me the stumbling block. I used to be a believer, a Sunday school teacher in fact, but later in life, I'm 57, I started thinking too much about it and listening to both sides of the whether it's TRUE debate.

 

Ultimately the conflict with scientific, rather than anthropocentiric facts, just doesn't bear out.

It's good to debate it though and this thread with the exception of one fundamentalist/biblical literalist has been a really good thread.

 

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.

 

To me God's existence and the practice of religion are highly related but still different things. (Some believe in God but never go to church.) Religion makes lots of truth claims that go beyond the existence of God or the age of the earth that are still open for debate, such as the claim that it's wise and good to love ones enemy.  Further, there are plenty of actions that the church or its members take which can be debated on the grounds of ethics or health.  Churchgoing is still strongly correlated with both giving to charity and to volunteering time (http://www.gallup.com/poll/21430/americans-more-likely-donate-money-time-charities.aspx), but American Protestants are also more likely to support the government's use of torture.

 

The debate about God's existence defies logical scrutiny (when the definition of God is highly disputed among theologians and the definition of existence is highly disputed among ontologists, you're kind of stuck), but there's plenty about religion that can be held to logical or ethical scrutiny, and should be.

[Fourcandles]

To me God's existence and the practice of religion are highly related but still different things. (Some believe in God but never go to church.) Religion makes lots of truth claims that go beyond the existence of God or the age of the earth that are still open for debate, such as the claim that it's wise and good to love ones enemy.  Further, there are plenty of actions that the church or its members take which can be debated on the grounds of ethics or health.  Churchgoing is still strongly correlated with both giving to charity and to volunteering time (http://www.gallup.com/poll/21430/americans-more-likely-donate-money-time-charities.aspx), but American Protestants are also more likely to support the government's use of torture.

 

The debate about God's existence defies logical scrutiny (when the definition of God is highly disputed among theologians and the definition of existence is highly disputed among ontologists, you're kind of stuck), but there's plenty about religion that can be held to logical or ethical scrutiny, and should be.

 

 

I take it you are Theist as opposed to a Deist? Please correct me if I'm wrong.?

 

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[Watt-Zeefuik]

I take it you are Theist as opposed to a Deist? Please correct me if I'm wrong.?

 

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Roughly yes.

 

Closer to say that the concept of a tripartite personified God is a flawed (seen "through a glass darkly") but workable human understanding which points to a force greater than human conception.  But God didn't create and quit, as the deist would claim.

[Section Q]

Love them or hate them you are allowed to say what you want about Christians, but attack Jews and you can get locked up. Personally I don't have any time for any of them. Hope that offends them all......Q....!!!

[Fourcandles]

Roughly yes.

 

Closer to say that the concept of a tripartite personified God is a flawed (seen "through a glass darkly") but workable human understanding which points to a force greater than human conception.  But God didn't create and quit, as the deist would claim.

 

Would the "Roughly yes" answer therefore indicate that as a Theist you believe God intervenes/affects/influences matters down here on plant earth i.e answers prayers? the conventional theist position.??

 

 

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[Sidelight]

2000+ years of Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and secular scholarship?  Critical thought?  When it's bleedingly obvious?

 

Okay, that last one isn't quite fair, as alfajambo points out, lots of scholars disagree with whether it's "obvious."  It's obvious that no one was around to record God creating the heavens and the earth, so the question there is whether God divinely dictated to Moses the first five books of the Bible to be passed on, as certain sects of Orthodox Jews believe, and which has been adopted by some Christians.  So you can either believe that, or you can believe something closer to the Documentary Hypothesis, that they're ancient texts that were composed and edited by multiple people over history, and that the recording of them in writing was an event that happened after the Babylonian captivity at the insistence of the Persian imperial government.  (I suppose you could also believe, as i8hibsh has suggested, that it was all invented like 500 years ago, but I'd say there's overwhelming empirical evidence against that.)  To me, the early chapters of Genesis make a whole lot more sense as the recording of ancient myths that were composed and modified to teach lessons within a particular culture than as Moses taking time out of his schedule to dutifully write down God's dictation word-for-word, and the whole "this is God's word" thing as a kind of cultural understanding to preserve the language in-tact without every would-be theologian coming along and deciding it needs another edit, but others disagree.  You believe what makes sense to you.

 

So there's sects of Christianity that think that every word of the Bible is the literal and inerrant Word of God.  I disagree, partially because I simply don't have the capacity to believe in a God whose literal and inerrant word is that contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing.  I *can* believe that the Bible is written by humans, and that humans are generally contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing, but that occasionally we try to set their eyes on something more noble, eternal, and righteous than ourselves, and it's worth paying attention to those places throughout history where people have tried to do this.  As my cousin eloquently puts it, God is a mystery.  No human in history (even including Jesus during his time incarnate as human, canonically Mat 24:36) can comprehend that mystery fully, but we can get snippets of it, and we try to point to the mystery.

 

The answer to your last question is really long, and I'm guessing you don't really care about the full answer.  The short, short, short version is that sometimes I do think God is a myth, but my life seems to be better and I like myself better when I behave as if God isn't a myth.  Hence "belief" is more of an action than a state of mind.  I'm incapable of knowing for sure one way or the other.

 

I understand a conflict in worldview, but a conflict with science...

Are you relating your comments to Neo Darwinism?

 

For clarity when discussing evolution, my definition is observed variation in species only.

[Sidelight]

I understand a conflict in worldview, but a conflict with science...

Are you relating your comments to Neo Darwinism?

 

For clarity when discussing evolution, my definition is observed variation in species only.

 

Sorry UA posted in incorrect slot.

 

In the bath watching Vil v Liv

[Sidelight]

Though I'm an atheist I can see that Christianity is useful to some people.

I actually like the atonosphere in church, the singing, the stained glass windows, the people of goodwill it usually seems to attract, the comfort and community factors too.

 

However the Utilitarian argument adds nothing to the whether it's true or not and that's for me the stumbling block. I used to be a believer, a Sunday school teacher in fact, but later in life, I'm 57, I started thinking too much about it and listening to both sides of the whether it's TRUE debate.

 

Ultimately the conflict with scientific, rather than anthropocentiric facts, just doesn't bear out.

It's good to debate it though and this thread with the exception of one fundamentalist/biblical literalist has been a really good thread.

 

.

 

.

 

I understand a conflict in worldview, but a conflict with science...

Are you relating your comments to Neo Darwinism?

 

For clarity when discussing evolution, my definition is observed variation in species only.

[Fourcandles]

I understand a conflict in worldview, but a conflict with science...

Are you relating your comments to Neo Darwinism?

 

For clarity when discussing evolution, my definition is observed variation in species only.

 

Firstly no nothing to do with evolution, it was a Stephen J Gould NOMA type reference.

 

Secondly I understand your stance is pro the  talking snake, naked Adam and Eve version of where Homo sapiens came from. There would be zero point in discussing this with you - it would be akin to trying to talk a Tailban Mullah into a different stance on an issue they have been brainwashed into. Pointless.

 

If you don't understand the base conflict between science and religion you know nothing.

 

For example, If you believe that  a Deity is operating here, down here on earth, twiddling buttons, influencing outcomes then how would you ever believe the results of any medical trial. I mean the results of a cancer drug trial WOULD be influenced by an intervening Deity if the correct prayers and propitiations were offered. Science in this event might as well pack up and give up and go home.

 

An immaculate conception, a virgin birth, a resurrection and 'miracles' to name but a few are in ABSOLUTE and DIRECT conflict with Biology, physics and chemistry. Period. 

 

The trouble is that people like you get a free ride. You are happy to slap science in the face with your claims, yet equally happy to reap the benefits if confers on you.

If the real choice was to live with your medieval views and not benefit from the hundreds nay thousands of benefits science confers on you the choice would be very different - you would convert back to the real world very quickly. However fortunately for you its not a choice you have to make, in a free society you can slap science in the face whilst reaping its benefits to your hearts content.

 

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[Watt-Zeefuik]

Would the "Roughly yes" answer therefore indicate that as a Theist you believe God intervenes/affects/influences matters down here on plant earth i.e answers prayers? the conventional theist position.??

 

 

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I think there'd be a fair amount of argument about what the "conventional theist position" is, but there are a fair number in that category who would probably call me a heretic and an apostate.

 

Anyway, the interventionist question is not a terribly central feature in my theology, but your question is a fair one, so I'm trying to have a go at it.  I think formally I'd place it in that category of "mystery" -- that is to say unknowable, but more informally I'd point to quotations like Meister Eckhart's "God is a great underground river that no one can stop and no one can dam up," or King's "the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice."  That is, there is no part of creation that is not being constantly touched by the Spirit, constantly impacted by it.

 

"Answers prayers" is another complicated one.  God is not a general tech support line whom one can call upon and say, "God, it would be great if you could make Hearts beat Celtic 2-1 on the weekend, with Paterson as FGS, will help my coupon and help me make the rent."  Rather, grace is something we are always receiving, and the act of prayer (including asking for things) is a means of connecting us with the abundance of grace (or call it the presence of the Spirit) that is always moving around us and through us, but which we forget about some times.  Further, the act of articulating our desires to God in language helps reframe our cognitive states towards understanding where we are already being helped.  (It also can calm the mind when in a situation which is beyond our control.)

 

These are quick answers as I procrastinate some work I need to do tonight, so I may come back and read this and writes something else like, "no, that comes off wrong, let me try again..."

[Maple Leaf]

For clarity when discussing evolution, my definition is observed variation in species only.

Evolution by natural selection is a fact.  Biologists are usually reluctant to use the word 'fact' when discussing their work, but the theory has been verified beyond all reasonable doubt.  Species originate through natural selection; there is no other biological alternative.  The arrival of molecular biology ended the discussion.  All living things are related, and DNA proves it.  Every existing species evolved from an earlier species.

 

Religious faith is not a credible alternative to scientific evidence.

[Norm]

Evolution by natural selection is a fact. Biologists are usually reluctant to use the word 'fact' when discussing their work, but the theory has been verified beyond all reasonable doubt. Species originate through natural selection; there is no other biological alternative. The arrival of molecular biology ended the discussion. All living things are related, and DNA proves it. Every existing species evolved from an earlier species.

 

Religious faith is not a credible alternative to scientific evidence.

 

Doesn't matter. I can't explain what I want to say adequately so I'll not bother.

[Sidelight]

Firstly no nothing to do with evolution, it was a Stephen J Gould NOMA type reference.

 

Secondly I understand your stance is pro the  talking snake, naked Adam and Eve version of where Homo sapiens came from. There would be zero point in discussing this with you - it would be akin to trying to talk a Tailban Mullah into a different stance on an issue they have been brainwashed into. Pointless.

 

If you don't understand the base conflict between science and religion you know nothing.

 

For example, If you believe that  a Deity is operating here, down here on earth, twiddling buttons, influencing outcomes then how would you ever believe the results of any medical trial. I mean the results of a cancer drug trial WOULD be influenced by an intervening Deity if the correct prayers and propitiations were offered. Science in this event might as well pack up and give up and go home.

 

An immaculate conception, a virgin birth, a resurrection and 'miracles' to name but a few are in ABSOLUTE and DIRECT conflict with Biology, physics and chemistry. Period. 

 

The trouble is that people like you get a free ride. You are happy to slap science in the face with your claims, yet equally happy to reap the benefits if confers on you.

If the real choice was to live with your medieval views and not benefit from the hundreds nay thousands of benefits science confers on you the choice would be very different - you would convert back to the real world very quickly. However fortunately for you its not a choice you have to make, in a free society you can slap science in the face whilst reaping its benefits to your hearts content.

 

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With regards to non-overlapping magisteria:

If the bible and science are not related then no problem. Move on.

However, that?s not the case. How can we isolate science from scripture, when the simple fact is that the bible itself communicates some of the things science discusses?

And they are extremely important considerations.

Namely the origin of the universe and the origin of life.

Without doubt they are foundational to both science and philosophy.

History shows that non belief in God affords no more a guarantee of science orthodoxy that one with a belief in God.

And as you are perhaps aware origin science upholds the principle of causality. [Cause and effect]

You know the score, clapping your hands can cause a big bang!

Today observation shows that intelligence is required to manufacture coded complex information. Therefore we can assume the same for past time.

This suggests that because there was no material intelligent designer agent for life, then it is perfectly legitimate to suggest a non-material designer.

As far as a ?deity twiddling buttons? during a medical trial is concerned, the exact opposite is true from your sentiment expressed.

Non belief that the universe was designed and made by a God of order, leaves us with no basis for the orderly universe we observe. How can our own thoughts even be trusted?

J.P. Moreland ? philosopher and apologist says it much better than me.

 ?But some will object, ?If we allowed appealing to God anytime we don?t understand something, then science itself would be impossible, for science proceeds on the assumption of natural causality.? This argument is a red herring. It is true that science is not compatible with just any form of theism, particularly a theism that holds to a capricious god who intervenes so often that the contrast between primary and secondary causality is unintelligible. But Christian theism holds that secondary causality is God?s usual mode and primary causality is infrequent, comparatively speaking. That is why Christianity, far from hindering the development of science, actually provided the womb for its birth and development.?

Christianity and the Nature of Science:

A Philosophical Investigation - Page 226.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

 

Today observation shows that intelligence is required to manufacture coded complex information. Therefore we can assume the same for past time.

 

What's your source for this?  I would tend to disagree, but am curious about your basis for the assertion.

 

(I also agree that Gould's "non-overlapping magesteria" is an ugly kludge that doesn't help anything, but based on past discussion we disagree on how to resolve the tension.) 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

Evolution by natural selection is a fact.  Biologists are usually reluctant to use the word 'fact' when discussing their work, but the theory has been verified beyond all reasonable doubt.  Species originate through natural selection; there is no other biological alternative.  The arrival of molecular biology ended the discussion.  All living things are related, and DNA proves it.  Every existing species evolved from an earlier species.

 

Religious faith is not a credible alternative to scientific evidence.

 

The other difficulty with this is that species boundaries are really hard to define and are far more fluid than grade school biology usually shows.  Many very distinct species will still hybridize with each other and produce fertile offspring.  (For this reason, biologists have largely dropped reproductive capacity as a definition for species in favor of morphology.)

 

So restricting evolution to "change within species" insists upon a very firm boundary which doesn't hold up in empirical observation.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

(Sorry for the three-straight replies -- I'm procrastinating something fierce today.)

 

 

As far as a ?deity twiddling buttons? during a medical trial is concerned, the exact opposite is true from your sentiment expressed.

Non belief that the universe was designed and made by a God of order, leaves us with no basis for the orderly universe we observe. How can our own thoughts even be trusted?

 

 

I largely agree with alfajambo on this one.  Today, due to modern secularism, the notion of an activist deity twiddling buttons seems absurd, but the modern conception of the universe being governed by "laws" doesn't seem strange at all.  In my opinion, while those laws certainly hold up under strenuous empirical investigation, exactly where those laws come from should be at least as troubling to our secular sensibilities as atheist critics of religion insist that "who created God?" should be to theists.  Where I part with alfajambo is that I don't think this proves God's existence, but I think it does leave us with quite a philosophical mess in the absence of belief in God, and highlights the very Judeo-Christian-Islamic origins of Western science.

 

Hence the early modernist move to deism -- a God that acts as law-giver.  I think that solves the problem exactly wrong -- it retains the abstract, intelligent, personified God, but provides no actual aid and comfort or call to help one another.

[Sidelight]

What's your source for this?  I would tend to disagree, but am curious about your basis for the assertion.

 

(I also agree that Gould's "non-overlapping magesteria" is an ugly kludge that doesn't help anything, but based on past discussion we disagree on how to resolve the tension.) 

 

What's your source for this?  I would tend to disagree, but am curious about your basis for the assertion.

 

(I also agree that Gould's "non-overlapping magesteria" is an ugly kludge that doesn't help anything, but based on past discussion we disagree on how to resolve the tension.) 

 

Where else does information originate other than from thought?

[Watt-Zeefuik]

Where else does information originate other than from thought?

 

This is a level of mathematics beyond what I can discuss with any confidence, but according to mathematical information theory, information comes from entropy.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory#Quantities_of_information

 

While I can't comment too much on information theory (except that it works rather well for cryptography and for measuring species diversity), it makes sense to me at some level. Understanding comes from thought, but information is not a product of the mind.

[Sidelight]

Evolution by natural selection is a fact.  Biologists are usually reluctant to use the word 'fact' when discussing their work, but the theory has been verified beyond all reasonable doubt.  Species originate through natural selection; there is no other biological alternative.  The arrival of molecular biology ended the discussion.  All living things are related, and DNA proves it.  Every existing species evolved from an earlier species.

 

Religious faith is not a credible alternative to scientific evidence.

No evolution is not a fact. You are quite wrong in your assertion.

The strongest evidence that has been presented for the notion of evolution in the last 150 years is the size change in the beaks of finches and the change in colour of moth?s wings.

This observation clearly shows variation. However to suggest that the route map of development of every living organism thus follows is not science but rather wishful thinking.

 

English Biologists Mae-Wan Ho and Peter Saunders write:

?It is now approximately fifty years since the neo-Darwinian synthesis was formulated. A great deal of research has been carried on within the paradigm it defines. Yet the success of the theory are limited to the minutiae of evolution, such as the adaptive change in colouration of moths; while it has remarkably little to say on the questions which interest us most, such as how there came to be moths in the first place.?

 

University of Georgia Geneticist John McDonald writes:

?The results of the last 20 years of research on the genetic basis of adaption has led us to a great Darwinian paradox. Those genes that are obviously variable within natural populations do not seem to lie at the basis of many major adaptive changes, while those genes that seemingly do constitute the foundation of many, if not most, major adaptive changes apparently are not variable within natural populations.?

 

Evolutionary Biologist Geneticist George Miklos writes:

?What then does this all-encompassing theory of evolution predict? Given a handful of postulates, such as random mutations, and selectin coefficients, it will predict changes in gene frequency over time. Is this what a grand theory of evolution ought to be about??

 

Jerry Coyne Evolutionary Scientist Ecology and Evolution ? Chicago University writes:

?We conclude unexpectedly that there is little evidence for the neo-Darwinian view: its theoretical foundations and the experimental evidence supporting it are weak.?

 

In conclusion James Le Fanu, reviewing the scientific consequences of the Human Genome Project argues that:

?We stand on the brink of a tectonic shift in our understanding of ourselves that will witness the eclipse of Darwin?s materialistic evolutionary theory. The doctrine of Darwinism is not merely flawed or in complete but its proposed mechanism of natural selection as the cause? of the diversity of living things is contradicted at every turn by the empirical evidence of science itself.?

[i8hibsh]

This family guy link sums it all up:

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ge45R9qoW_Y

[Maple Leaf]

No evolution is not a fact. You are quite wrong in your assertion.

The strongest evidence that has been presented for the notion of evolution in the last 150 years is the size change in the beaks of finches and the change in colour of moth?s wings.

This observation clearly shows variation. However to suggest that the route map of development of every living organism thus follows is not science but rather wishful thinking.

 

English Biologists Mae-Wan Ho and Peter Saunders write:

?It is now approximately fifty years since the neo-Darwinian synthesis was formulated. A great deal of research has been carried on within the paradigm it defines. Yet the success of the theory are limited to the minutiae of evolution, such as the adaptive change in colouration of moths; while it has remarkably little to say on the questions which interest us most, such as how there came to be moths in the first place.?

 

University of Georgia Geneticist John McDonald writes:

?The results of the last 20 years of research on the genetic basis of adaption has led us to a great Darwinian paradox. Those genes that are obviously variable within natural populations do not seem to lie at the basis of many major adaptive changes, while those genes that seemingly do constitute the foundation of many, if not most, major adaptive changes apparently are not variable within natural populations.?

 

Evolutionary Biologist Geneticist George Miklos writes:

?What then does this all-encompassing theory of evolution predict? Given a handful of postulates, such as random mutations, and selectin coefficients, it will predict changes in gene frequency over time. Is this what a grand theory of evolution ought to be about??

 

Jerry Coyne Evolutionary Scientist Ecology and Evolution ? Chicago University writes:

?We conclude unexpectedly that there is little evidence for the neo-Darwinian view: its theoretical foundations and the experimental evidence supporting it are weak.?

 

In conclusion James Le Fanu, reviewing the scientific consequences of the Human Genome Project argues that:

?We stand on the brink of a tectonic shift in our understanding of ourselves that will witness the eclipse of Darwin?s materialistic evolutionary theory. The doctrine of Darwinism is not merely flawed or in complete but its proposed mechanism of natural selection as the cause? of the diversity of living things is contradicted at every turn by the empirical evidence of science itself.?

 

Thanks for your answer.  If this was a poker game I would say, I'll see your 6 guys, and I'll raise you my 20,000 guys.  Then I could also do enough copy and paste to grind the JKB server to a standstill. 

 

But that isn't the point, is it?  We should be basing our position on the available evidence.

 

Whereas there will always be mavericks in any scientific community and we should always listen to what the mavericks have to say, (which is one of the reasons that science is so fascinating), the widely-held conclusions of the vast majority in that community are much more likely to be accurate.  For example;

 

The Round Earth Theory is widely accepted, but there are still some people who believe that the earth is flat. 

 

The Heliocentric Theory of the solar system is widely accepted, yet there are still some people who believe that the sun and all the planets orbit the earth.

 

The Theory of Plate Tectonics is widely accepted, but there are still some people who believe that the continents are too big to move.

 

The Theory of Evolution Through Natural Selection is widely accepted, but there are still people who believe that all life was created in its present form by a deity, some 6,000 years ago.

 

In the four examples I've quoted, the evidence for the theory is overwhelming.  What should you and I conclude?

 

Based on personal observation and experience, I don't have enough information about any of them, so I read all I can that is written by the experts in the field, both pro and con, then draw my  conclusions.  And the vast majority of what the experts write tells me that the evidence in support of the theories make all of them as close to being a scientific fact as it's possible to be.  Things might change if new evidence is uncovered, as was the case with Galileo but, until such time, I'll go with what existing evidence tells us.

 

As an aside, the two English biologists you quote seem to accept that species adaptation occurs, with moths as an example, while apparently rejecting the Theory of Evolution.  Someone should tell them that adaptation in species is a key component of Darwin's theory, and the theory is not all about speciation.  Their statement contradicts itself.

 

Evolution:  belief is voluntary, participation is not!

[Watt-Zeefuik]

No evolution is not a fact. You are quite wrong in your assertion.

The strongest evidence that has been presented for the notion of evolution in the last 150 years is the size change in the beaks of finches and the change in colour of moth?s wings.

This observation clearly shows variation. However to suggest that the route map of development of every living organism thus follows is not science but rather wishful thinking.

 

English Biologists Mae-Wan Ho and Peter Saunders write:

?It is now approximately fifty years since the neo-Darwinian synthesis was formulated. A great deal of research has been carried on within the paradigm it defines. Yet the success of the theory are limited to the minutiae of evolution, such as the adaptive change in colouration of moths; while it has remarkably little to say on the questions which interest us most, such as how there came to be moths in the first place.?

 

University of Georgia Geneticist John McDonald writes:

?The results of the last 20 years of research on the genetic basis of adaption has led us to a great Darwinian paradox. Those genes that are obviously variable within natural populations do not seem to lie at the basis of many major adaptive changes, while those genes that seemingly do constitute the foundation of many, if not most, major adaptive changes apparently are not variable within natural populations.?

 

Evolutionary Biologist Geneticist George Miklos writes:

?What then does this all-encompassing theory of evolution predict? Given a handful of postulates, such as random mutations, and selectin coefficients, it will predict changes in gene frequency over time. Is this what a grand theory of evolution ought to be about??

 

Jerry Coyne Evolutionary Scientist Ecology and Evolution ? Chicago University writes:

?We conclude unexpectedly that there is little evidence for the neo-Darwinian view: its theoretical foundations and the experimental evidence supporting it are weak.?

 

In conclusion James Le Fanu, reviewing the scientific consequences of the Human Genome Project argues that:

?We stand on the brink of a tectonic shift in our understanding of ourselves that will witness the eclipse of Darwin?s materialistic evolutionary theory. The doctrine of Darwinism is not merely flawed or in complete but its proposed mechanism of natural selection as the cause? of the diversity of living things is contradicted at every turn by the empirical evidence of science itself.?

 

This is, I'm afraid, a lot of misunderstanding of several of these quotes.  Jerry Coyne, one of the most obnoxious and frustrating atheist critics of Christianity, would probably spew up his dinner to find his quote was being used to argue against evolutionary theory in favor of creationism.  The Ho and Saunders quote as well as the Miklos quote are not asserting that evolutionary theory has failed, but rather that it still has a long way to go.  That does not override the rather incredible achievements the Modern Synthesis has made over the course of its short history.  Indeed, I know of no discipline of the sciences that has come close to answering all of its questions satisfactorily.

 

"Scientific fact" is a hard one to argue over -- people who study the processes of science itself will point out that facts are actually socially created things.  The original uses of the word "fact" came from the courtroom, to refer to assertions that have been deemed accepted by all sides in a dispute and established beyond challenge for the purposes of the hearing.  As such it's perfectly possible for facts to be wrong.  With that understanding, the Modern Synthesis is scientific fact.  There is no serious scientific challenge to it.  The exact details of how evolutionary change happens are under hot dispute, with no lesser titans than Richard Dawkins and E. O. Wilson going back and forth over genic selection and group selection, and really, really interesting work happening both at the field level and the molecular level.

 

However, if one shows up at any major university that wasn't founded by late-20th century evangelicals (like Oral Roberts or Liberty University) and attempts to get a job teaching biology while asserting that evolutionary theory is wrong and under dispute, you won't get the job.  If you go to any conference on genomics or ecology or immunology and assert that evolutionary theory isn't a fact, your results will be considered suspect.  This is because the global academy of biologists, almost to the level of consensus, has examined evolutionary theory as well as its alternatives and deemed there to be no acceptable alternative.  And the global academy is roughly the jury in the courtroom of science.  The Modern Synthesis of evolutionary theory, therefore, is scientific fact.

[Maple Leaf]

This is, I'm afraid, a lot of misunderstanding of several of these quotes.  Jerry Coyne, one of the most obnoxious and frustrating atheist critics of Christianity, would probably spew up his dinner to find his quote was being used to argue against evolutionary theory in favor of creationism.  The Ho and Saunders quote as well as the Miklos quote are not asserting that evolutionary theory has failed, but rather that it still has a long way to go.  That does not override the rather incredible achievements the Modern Synthesis has made over the course of its short history.  Indeed, I know of no discipline of the sciences that has come close to answering all of its questions satisfactorily.

 

"Scientific fact" is a hard one to argue over -- people who study the processes of science itself will point out that facts are actually socially created things.  The original uses of the word "fact" came from the courtroom, to refer to assertions that have been deemed accepted by all sides in a dispute and established beyond challenge for the purposes of the hearing.  As such it's perfectly possible for facts to be wrong.  With that understanding, the Modern Synthesis is scientific fact.  There is no serious scientific challenge to it.  The exact details of how evolutionary change happens are under hot dispute, with no lesser titans than Richard Dawkins and E. O. Wilson going back and forth over genic selection and group selection, and really, really interesting work happening both at the field level and the molecular level.

 

However, if one shows up at any major university that wasn't founded by late-20th century evangelicals (like Oral Roberts or Liberty University) and attempts to get a job teaching biology while asserting that evolutionary theory is wrong and under dispute, you won't get the job.  If you go to any conference on genomics or ecology or immunology and assert that evolutionary theory isn't a fact, your results will be considered suspect.  This is because the global academy of biologists, almost to the level of consensus, has examined evolutionary theory as well as its alternatives and deemed there to be no acceptable alternative.  And the global academy is roughly the jury in the courtroom of science.  The Modern Synthesis of evolutionary theory, therefore, is scientific fact.

 

Jerry Coyne has written a book called "Why Evolution is True."  I have a copy.  He would, indeed, be perplexed over anyone quoting him in an anti-evolution discussion.

[BRAVEHEART1874]

The bible is ike the sevco s daily record you read it and laugh and you think dose anyone apart from them really actually Beleive this tosh

hell I would hang on brycees every word more than give a seconds thought for some utter control Roman man made book that the leader decided what went in and what was left out

Thank god for science and common sense or we would still Beleive the earth was flat and what's wth all the similarities of the miracle claims from earlier beliefs of Greeks Egyptians is laughable but yet even today listening to leaders very understandable .

If you need to feel you have to live on when you die then fair enough but please dont ask me to build you a pyramid as I am too busy with my own Imprtance to care

[Sidelight]

This is, I'm afraid, a lot of misunderstanding of several of these quotes.  Jerry Coyne, one of the most obnoxious and frustrating atheist critics of Christianity, would probably spew up his dinner to find his quote was being used to argue against evolutionary theory in favor of creationism.  The Ho and Saunders quote as well as the Miklos quote are not asserting that evolutionary theory has failed, but rather that it still has a long way to go.  That does not override the rather incredible achievements the Modern Synthesis has made over the course of its short history.  Indeed, I know of no discipline of the sciences that has come close to answering all of its questions satisfactorily.

 

"Scientific fact" is a hard one to argue over -- people who study the processes of science itself will point out that facts are actually socially created things.  The original uses of the word "fact" came from the courtroom, to refer to assertions that have been deemed accepted by all sides in a dispute and established beyond challenge for the purposes of the hearing.  As such it's perfectly possible for facts to be wrong.  With that understanding, the Modern Synthesis is scientific fact.  There is no serious scientific challenge to it.  The exact details of how evolutionary change happens are under hot dispute, with no lesser titans than Richard Dawkins and E. O. Wilson going back and forth over genic selection and group selection, and really, really interesting work happening both at the field level and the molecular level.

 

However, if one shows up at any major university that wasn't founded by late-20th century evangelicals (like Oral Roberts or Liberty University) and attempts to get a job teaching biology while asserting that evolutionary theory is wrong and under dispute, you won't get the job.  If you go to any conference on genomics or ecology or immunology and assert that evolutionary theory isn't a fact, your results will be considered suspect.  This is because the global academy of biologists, almost to the level of consensus, has examined evolutionary theory as well as its alternatives and deemed there to be no acceptable alternative.  And the global academy is roughly the jury in the courtroom of science.  The Modern Synthesis of evolutionary theory, therefore, is scientific fact.

 

Sorry no misunderstanding, the quotes are legitimate and completely relevant to refuting the evolution is a fact scenario.

That aside it was your final paragraph that rather grabbed my attention. Or should I say the real meaning of the observation outlined which resulted in your rather definite conclusion.

Now it seems that you really do state the obvious here and therein lies the problem.

And that is that science is not so much concerned with the truth as it is with consensus.

Many scholars disagree with your stated conclusion. Even the definition of MS would in part invalidate your claim.

However I unsure if you are condoning or condemning the herd mentality prevailing in academic science to which you have alluded.

Have I got this correct?

I have a light brown dog. Yes I do.

My family and friends tell me the dog is black.

The dog is brown, but factually speaking the dog is black.

 

 

[Sidelight]

Jerry Coyne has written a book called "Why Evolution is True."  I have a copy.  He would, indeed, be perplexed over anyone quoting him in an anti-evolution discussion.

 

And.

[Sidelight]

And.

 

From afar 'And' sounds disrespectful, not what I intended.

Please accept my apology. You are a very respectful contributor.

 

I intentionally avoided quotes attributed to creation scientists.

[maroonlegions]

2000+ years of Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and secular scholarship?  Critical thought?  When it's bleedingly obvious?

 

Okay, that last one isn't quite fair, as alfajambo points out, lots of scholars disagree with whether it's "obvious."  It's obvious that no one was around to record God creating the heavens and the earth, so the question there is whether God divinely dictated to Moses the first five books of the Bible to be passed on, as certain sects of Orthodox Jews believe, and which has been adopted by some Christians.  So you can either believe that, or you can believe something closer to the Documentary Hypothesis, that they're ancient texts that were composed and edited by multiple people over history, and that the recording of them in writing was an event that happened after the Babylonian captivity at the insistence of the Persian imperial government.  (I suppose you could also believe, as i8hibsh has suggested, that it was all invented like 500 years ago, but I'd say there's overwhelming empirical evidence against that.)  To me, the early chapters of Genesis make a whole lot more sense as the recording of ancient myths that were composed and modified to teach lessons within a particular culture than as Moses taking time out of his schedule to dutifully write down God's dictation word-for-word, and the whole "this is God's word" thing as a kind of cultural understanding to preserve the language in-tact without every would-be theologian coming along and deciding it needs another edit, but others disagree.  You believe what makes sense to you.

 

So there's sects of Christianity that think that every word of the Bible is the literal and inerrant Word of God.  I disagree, partially because I simply don't have the capacity to believe in a God whose literal and inerrant word is that contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing.  I *can* believe that the Bible is written by humans, and that humans are generally contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing, but that occasionally we try to set their eyes on something more noble, eternal, and righteous than ourselves, and it's worth paying attention to those places throughout history where people have tried to do this.  As my cousin eloquently puts it, God is a mystery.  No human in history (even including Jesus during his time incarnate as human, canonically Mat 24:36) can comprehend that mystery fully, but we can get snippets of it, and we try to point to the mystery.

 

The answer to your last question is really long, and I'm guessing you don't really care about the full answer.  The short, short, short version is that sometimes I do think God is a myth, but my life seems to be better and I like myself better when I behave as if God isn't a myth.  Hence "belief" is more of an action than a state of mind.  I'm incapable of knowing for sure one way or the other.

 

I will say one thing, the moment someone , some  concept or religious doctrine tries to morally feck my mind with visions of an eternal hell if i do not succumb to its ways then they can get to feck..  

 

You look closely at the bible and  try to differentiate between fact and fiction based myth  that relies on the concept of faith  and then pontificate on why it  is any more believable than extraterrestrial intelligence that is way beyond the version of the  biblical "man made in gods image"??

 

  The bible was never intended to be fully understood  why?   because it was was intended  as a moral based mind feck for control of the ignorant, that is,for  those who have not studied the occult..and can see through its bullshite , the bible manipulates the "what if"s" of life after death,

 

It relies on the fear and ignorance, nothing more and that is why it has failed in every generational pursuit to create heaven on earth.. or peace...

 

 

Eternal hell as a punishment for simply not succumbing to a doctrine or teaching that is by far  mainly based on nothing more than faith, feck that..

 

Sorry but i value my soul and its destiny a bit more than what religious dogmatic faith systems offer thanks..   

 

There are no words for my contempt of this outrageous and arrogant mind set and those who dreamt it up, who could take such a god seriously and with any believability who is that EVIL , it promises ones soul damnation if one dos not comply, utter insanity...

 

Reality asylum is one way of describing religious dogmatic scriptures, man made fear of the ignorant for nothing more than moral blackmail and the  fear of the unknown.. or life after death..

[deesidejambo]

I will say one thing, the moment someone , some  concept or religious doctrine tries to morally feck my mind with visions of an eternal hell if i do not succumb to its ways then they can get to feck..  

 

You look closely at the bible and  try to differentiate between fact and fiction based myth  that relies on the concept of faith  and then pontificate on why it  is any more believable than extraterrestrial intelligence that is way beyond the version of the  biblical "man made in gods image"??

 

  The bible was never intended to be fully understood  why?   because it was was intended  as a moral based mind feck for control of the ignorant, that is,for  those who have not studied the occult..and can see through its bullshite , the bible manipulates the "what if"s" of life after death,

 

It relies on the fear and ignorance, nothing more and that is why it has failed in every generational pursuit to create heaven on earth.. or peace...

 

 

Eternal hell as a punishment for simply not succumbing to a doctrine or teaching that is by far  mainly based on nothing more than faith, feck that..

 

Sorry but i value my soul and its destiny a bit more than what religious dogmatic faith systems offer thanks..   

 

There are no words for my contempt of this outrageous and arrogant mind set and those who dreamt it up, who could take such a god seriously and with any believability who is that EVIL , it promises ones soul damnation if one dos not comply, utter insanity...

 

Reality asylum is one way of describing religious dogmatic scriptures, man made fear of the ignorant for nothing more than moral blackmail and the  fear of the unknown.. or life after death..

I don't think their intent was evil.      Who knows how or why they wrote the bible.

 

but I do agree that the concept of "church" is a mind-control exercise.   You point out yourself that you value your soul which tells me you have a belief in afterlife, but that is of course very different to a belief in a religious doctrine.

 

At last we agree on something.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

 

Sorry no misunderstanding, the quotes are legitimate and completely relevant to refuting the evolution is a fact scenario.

That aside it was your final paragraph that rather grabbed my attention. Or should I say the real meaning of the observation outlined which resulted in your rather definite conclusion.

Now it seems that you really do state the obvious here and therein lies the problem.

And that is that science is not so much concerned with the truth as it is with consensus.

Many scholars disagree with your stated conclusion. Even the definition of MS would in part invalidate your claim.

However I unsure if you are condoning or condemning the herd mentality prevailing in academic science to which you have alluded.

Have I got this correct?

I have a light brown dog. Yes I do.

My family and friends tell me the dog is black.

The dog is brown, but factually speaking the dog is black.

 

Science is at its heart a social process.  The love-in with positivism in the 20th century taught everyone that it was hypothesis/experiment/analysis/verification, but that's really only a very small part of it and excludes a rather enormous amount of very famous scientific work from it.  I see something, I theorize about it, I record my observations and publish them along with my conclusions.  Someone else comes along and reads that and goes and does similar observations.  They write up how what they see compares to what i see.

 

If everyone who's looking starts seeing and publishing the same thing, it gets boring to talk about that and after a while we stop talking about it.  That's scientific consensus -- scientific fact.  As to your dog, could you take some photos and write up a brief argument about why the dog is brown rather than black?  Would it be convincing to a neutral observer?  Is there some authority on dog color that could adjudicate the matter?  If so, you've challenged the "fact" that your dog is black.  

 

You can call that a "herd mentality," and certainly Thomas Kuhn made everyone appreciate just how much fads and groupthink in science can hold things up, but it's how science works, warts and all.  Evolutionary theory stands waiting for the convincing evidence that undermines it all.  Instead, what it generally gets is misunderstandings of the conversation that are asserted as that evidence. 

 

As to Coyne -- it appears you are not the first to pull that particular quote.  The author Behe appears to have done so before, and Coyne, predictably, lost his s--- over it.  (Bear in mind that although I'm agreeing with Coyne here, I still think he's kind of a jerk.)

 

http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2005/06/from-the-quote.html

 

From this I think I can explain what Coyne is talking about relatively briefly.

 

By the classic Modern Synthesis, there are four things that can change genetic frequency in a population:

 

1 - Natural selection (adaptation)

2 - Genetic drift

3 - Mutation

4 - Non-random mating

 

What Coyne is getting into an argument about, which is an ongoing argument that Gould and Lewontin and Wilson and Dawkins and all kinds of folks have been arguing about for several decades, is just how much of a role adaptation plays in this versus the other ones.  The "neo-Darwinian view" that Coyne is referring to hear is one that Lewontin earlier called the "adaptivist view," which is basically evolutionary science that assumes adaptation rules the roost and everything else is just stuff around the edges.  What Coyne is disagreeing with is the balance of the above four factors.  What he is NOT doing, as he so strenuously says in the link above, is disagreeing with the Modern Synthesis, which encompasses both his view and the one he's disagreeing with.

 

This is effectively quoting part of Psalm 14:1 as saying, "There is no God" and saying that clearly the Bible says there's no God.  In Behe's case, it's rather clearly either lying by quoting or really, seriously not understanding the debate.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

Responding to maroonlegions, setting aside only for the moment the truth-value of the whole of the Bible or parts of it, it's a fair question as to whether the books of the Bible were written out of earnest belief or out of cynical manipulation.  i8hibsh and I got into this in the other thread where he asserted (roughly speaking) that the understanding of the Bible as a collection of various writings composed over a millennium was wrong, and that it was actually hacked together by the Catholic church at some later date.

 

I think his claim falls apart very quickly under any kind of scrutiny.  The claim that there's some cynical manipulation in the Bible is a little harder to dismiss -- there's an argument ( the first six books were assembled from other texts by someone who had some manner of an agenda, potentially the biblical figure Ezra himself.  And certainly all hands that have either written the later texts or touched the texts since, whether the ecumenical councils or translators or anyone, have intentionally or unintentionally left their traces on it.  What is difficult to substantiate, in my opinion, is that either all or the majority of these people had as their number one goal the control and manipulation of people.  (It's far easier to make the case that that was a secondary goal for some of them, or that a handful of them were up to no good.)

 

However, I would fully agree with you that it's an undeniable historical fact that in many times and places the Bible has been used for control first and for salvation or education either second or not at all.

[Stephen Muddie]

It's amazing how many people think they are Gods.

I lied. This is my last post in this RW creep-fest.

[Norm]

It's amazing how many people think they are Gods.

 

 

Why?

 

They're right.

[Thaw]

2000+ years of Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and secular scholarship?  Critical thought?  When it's bleedingly obvious?

 

Okay, that last one isn't quite fair, as alfajambo points out, lots of scholars disagree with whether it's "obvious."  It's obvious that no one was around to record God creating the heavens and the earth, so the question there is whether God divinely dictated to Moses the first five books of the Bible to be passed on, as certain sects of Orthodox Jews believe, and which has been adopted by some Christians.  So you can either believe that, or you can believe something closer to the Documentary Hypothesis, that they're ancient texts that were composed and edited by multiple people over history, and that the recording of them in writing was an event that happened after the Babylonian captivity at the insistence of the Persian imperial government.  (I suppose you could also believe, as i8hibsh has suggested, that it was all invented like 500 years ago, but I'd say there's overwhelming empirical evidence against that.)  To me, the early chapters of Genesis make a whole lot more sense as the recording of ancient myths that were composed and modified to teach lessons within a particular culture than as Moses taking time out of his schedule to dutifully write down God's dictation word-for-word, and the whole "this is God's word" thing as a kind of cultural understanding to preserve the language in-tact without every would-be theologian coming along and deciding it needs another edit, but others disagree.  You believe what makes sense to you.

 

So there's sects of Christianity that think that every word of the Bible is the literal and inerrant Word of God.  I disagree, partially because I simply don't have the capacity to believe in a God whose literal and inerrant word is that contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing.  I *can* believe that the Bible is written by humans, and that humans are generally contradictory, at times mean-spirited, murderous, and confusing, but that occasionally we try to set their eyes on something more noble, eternal, and righteous than ourselves, and it's worth paying attention to those places throughout history where people have tried to do this.  As my cousin eloquently puts it, God is a mystery.  No human in history (even including Jesus during his time incarnate as human, canonically Mat 24:36) can comprehend that mystery fully, but we can get snippets of it, and we try to point to the mystery.

 

The answer to your last question is really long, and I'm guessing you don't really care about the full answer.  The short, short, short version is that sometimes I do think God is a myth, but my life seems to be better and I like myself better when I behave as if God isn't a myth.  Hence "belief" is more of an action than a state of mind.  I'm incapable of knowing for sure one way or the other.

 

Many thanks for this post, especially the parts highlighted. I think this is fairly close to my own view.

[Jambo 4 Ever]

What about those who say everything in the bible is literally true?

[Maple Leaf]

What about those who say everything in the bible is literally true?

What about them?  What are your thoughts?

[Craigieboy]

What about those who say everything in the bible is literally true?

Well I'm still scratching my head as to how the penguins and polar bears travelled on foot to somewhere in the Middle East to board the big boat made by a 600 year old man and his kids.

 

[Jambo 4 Ever]

Well I'm still scratching my head as to how the penguins and polar bears travelled on foot to somewhere in the Middle East to board the big boat made by a 600 year old man and his kids.

 

Haha yeh fair enough but where is the evidence to say it is not true? I don't believe it either but don't know enough about these sort of things

[Craigieboy]

Haha yeh fair enough but where is the evidence to say it is not true? I don't believe it either but don't know enough about these sort of things

You need evidence that the above, isn't true?

[Maple Leaf]

You need evidence that the above, isn't true?

It is impossible for the Noah's ark story to be literally true.  Impossible.

 

Either it is a myth, or the Bible got it wrong.

[Michael_Jackson]

.

[Boab]

It is impossible for the Noah's ark story to be literally true.  Impossible.

 

Either it is a myth, or the Bible got it wrong.

 

 

60 year old man and two very, very old bears with white hair that looked a bit like polar bears.

 

More plausible...we're getting there !

[Rabgee]

this says it all and its catchy as well

[Watt-Zeefuik]

What about those who say everything in the bible is literally true?

 

I'm with Maple Leaf, what are your thoughts?  What inspired you to ask the question?

[Jambo 4 Ever]

I'm with Maple Leaf, what are your thoughts? What inspired you to ask the question?

I have a number of extended family members who all believe the bible is literal in what it says and I don't believe it is... But I don't know enough about what is in the bible to back up the idea that it can not be literally true

[Norm]

I have a number of extended family members who all believe the bible is literal in what it says and I don't believe it is... But I don't know enough about what is in the bible to back up the idea that it can not be literally true

You seem to have a lot of questions about the bible and Christianity, why not give it a read?

[Jambo-Jimbo]

I have a number of extended family members who all believe the bible is literal in what it says and I don't believe it is... But I don't know enough about what is in the bible to back up the idea that it can not be literally true

 

Read it, then research it, you seem good at searching the internet for information, once you've done that then you might be able to make your own mind up whether it's all true or not, whether it's for you or not, rather than ask folks on a forum where all your going to get is a multitude of different views.

 

Only you can decide if you believe in the bible or not.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

I have a number of extended family members who all believe the bible is literal in what it says and I don't believe it is... But I don't know enough about what is in the bible to back up the idea that it can not be literally true

 

Thanks, that certainly helps with perspective.

 

I disagree with those who say it is literally true, and think it causes problems and drives people away from the core messages, but I also know people who fervently believe that and they're kind and generous for the most part.

 

Bart Ehrman is Biblical scholar, a former fundamentalist, and now agnostic.  His book, "Misquoting Jesus" (Ehrman himself will tell you he didn't get to pick the title) is mostly about minor differences in the early versions of Biblical texts (most of which are things like spelling and punctuation), but his introduction gets into a lot of the reasons he couldn't continue to believe in Biblical literalism.  He has a follow-up (which his attention-seeking publishers named, "Forged") that covers a few of the epistles of the New Testament that claim to be written by Paul but almost certainly weren't.  (I personally have read most of Misquoting but have not read Forged.)

 

Marcus Borg has also written many books that engage in Biblical scholarship but which argue against Biblical literalism: http://www.marcusjborg.com/my-books/

 

Of course your relatives will disagree with me.  They will have resources of their own.

 

You'll have to sort it out for yourself, find out which voices seem trustworthy and coherent.  "Nobody else can walk it for you," as the song goes.