That’s not the source of confusion. It’s about what “deadening of wonder” and “greatly reduce the possibilities” mean.
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So good to know I’ve been merely confusing, 'cause I didn’t want it to be insulting.
All the Best!
The non-insulting thing to do when someone expresses confusion would be to explain.
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No matter what I say, you won’t agree, and I’m okay with that.
What did it seem to mean to you?
Who says I’m trying to be “polite,” exactly?
What if I’m trying to be provocative of a new thought on yours or someone elses’ parts? It is a public forum, after all, and not a private conversation.
So when you try to turn it into a public referendum on my character, on my end that’s just ad hominem.
Sound familiar?
I have found that it’s sometimes better to give others a chance to explore an interpretation, than to simply answer what may be an insincere retort.
I’m sure that sounds familiar, too.
It is a greatly reductive position to take that God does not exist, as it deadens wonder, rather than answering it. Is that the whole answer? Obviously, not. There’s still plenty to wonder about.
This is the bit that nobody knows the meaning of. And apparently you refuse to explain. I don’t see anywhere to go from there.
And I’m sorry, but I found that comment to be mostly incoherent muttering, rather like Captain Queeg’s courtroom monologue in The Caine Mutiny.
Guy, your denial of Allen’s observation made no sense.
I think that you can be provocative without making obviously false claims, such as claiming that both creationists and evolutionary biologists are interpreting the same evidence differently, or even worse, that atheism is somehow a deadening of wonder.
The latter one is just insanely wrong, given the vast overrepresentation of atheists among scientists, people primarily motivated by their sense of wonder. It just compounds the former false statement, as you’re not interested in biology.
I think that you’re the one making it a referendum on your character. If you feel a need to misrepresent what others believe to defend your position, your position likely isn’t worth defending.
I have no idea how that explains or justifies your moving of the goalposts when challenged on a false claim, nor your false attribution of levels of wondering to others.
For the record, I don’t take that position; I predict that you will ignore that.
My point is that I find a highly negative correlation between YOUR position of evolution denialism and wonder. Academics who deny evolution produce far less new evidence–as in pretty much zero–to stoke our wonder than do those who accept it.
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Maybe if you stopped trying to talk in riddles, you might communicate more effectively.
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Then perhaps you should try to be clear and concise when you’re being provocative, rather than just confusing?
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I am being clear, but mental blocks are intervening. Nothing I can do about that.
Your mental blocks, or are you claiming that we have mental blocks? It would seem that you may be able to do something about the former.
This is merely anecdotal on my part but I would readily make the observation that no atheist I’ve ever met exhibited any “deadening of wonder.” (And the atheist scientists I’ve known were much like every other scientist: their wonderment and fascination and curiosity about science led them to the pursuit of that career path!)
Sadly, I have known some theists who seemed to have very little sense of wonder about science and the natural world. I would apply the word apathy to their approach. So I just don’t understand the basis of the claim that atheism [a questionable category since atheism doesn’t somehow have an official position on such things] somehow involves a “deadening of wonder.”
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I have too, and that set pretty much overlaps with the set that deny evolution.
I don’t think that Guy is going to explain, because I don’t think he is capable of doing so.
I don’t think you’re being clear, and I don’t think there are any mental blocks intervening. This is just an excuse you invoke to avoid having to express yourself in ways that will make your assertions amenable to rational analysis.
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Good to know you’re clear about my supposed shortcomings of logic and expression.
Dawkins running away when Craig came to Oxford 10/10
Dawkins competence in religion/science 2/10
Dawkins’ honesty 3/10 (still three points higher than Larry Kruass)
Dawkins getting his arse handed to back to him at the Cambridge Union 8/10.
Definitely a mixed bag.
It looks like Craig believes in an historical Adam, and will be working with @jack.collins and @Agauger to come up with an ancient Adam model since he finds your more recent Adam/GA model hermeneutically unconvincing. In his last defenders class, he says that the genealogies give Genesis an historical backbone and he quoted Walton favorably saying that we aren’t supposed to believe that any of the characters in the genealogies never existed.
It’s either in this podcast or the one before it that he says these things. Listened to them earlier this week, I apologize. https://content.blubrry.com/52716/RF_DEFENDERS_CREATION_OF_LIFE_AND_BIO-DIVERSITY_Part_16_2019.mp3
I’m a bit sad. I was partially hoping he’d follow Tremper Longman as an inerrancy affirming Adam agnostic. But it does not seem to be the case. 
.
Congrats, @Agauger, although Craig probably accepts common descent, it looks like you’ve probably won over a follower to your model while @swamidass and I have lost out on a potential highly influential defender.
Perhaps I’m wrong, but I doubt it. He’s made comments all throughout this recent series indicating he believes Adam and Eve are historical people, and he’s made it quite clear elsewhere that he thinks Wright’s idea of A&E as priests leading a larger population as also unconvincing. He’s definitely stuck with an ancient sole genetic progenitor model.
I suppose it’s still up in the air though, whether he will go for @Agauger’s very ancient model or Fuz Rana’s more “recent” ancient model.
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You have wildley misread the situation. I just spent two days with him. In a few month I might have some news to announce.
@Agauger’s model is not acceptable to him, by the way.
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He said in his last newsletter he doesn’t find your model acceptable. Has this changed? I’m very curious how I misread him. It seems
this leaves Hugh Ross’s model unless he has some other idea entirely. I suppose he could still think Genesis 2-3 isn’t about historical persons, but I doubt it.
Could you explain the Gauger and Ross models? How does an ancient Adam fit the genealogies at all?
@mark you misunderstanding my role in this and what is going on with WLC. It’s a good thing. You have front row seats to a really interesting conversation. It is far from over and you don’t even know what I’m arguing for.