Rauser: What’s Wrong with YEC

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That’s quite an accusation. Perhaps he actually investigated scientific claims for evolution and agreed with them?

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Because that could have been a deal-breaker with his legal career?

But that informed individuals could be sincerely persuaded would lend credibility to the evidence, so there has to be some sinister ulterior motive.

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Actually, I think he just gave up. When you give up, you can make big mistakes.

So now that we have moved into an entirely different subject matter, can all opponents here to a literal 24-hour day interpretation of Genesis step back and take a new critical view of your position and admit, “Gee, I might have really missed something. Perhaps there is a way after all that Genesis days can be taken literally”.

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So, in actuality, there are three separate assertions that you’ve made:

  1. He embraced evolution to win favor.
  2. He was motivated by the evidence.
  3. He just gave up.

It’s interesting how you have so much insight into the minds of others. It is really a gift.

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46

Incorrect on 2 out of 3 points.

  1. He was out to win favor. I will stick by that one. Give him a shout if you want.
  2. He was motivated by a body of evidence which he thought was out of the bounds of interpretation. Turns out he was wrong - it was simply an interpretation after all, not fact.
  3. It is my opinion that he just gave up (in my post I said “I think”).
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Thanks for clarifying that I was correct on one out of three. To review the two points about which I’m apparently incorrect… According to you:

He was not motivated by the evidence. He was, instead, motivated by a body of evidence.

He didn’t just give up. You think that he just gave up.

Thanks for this.

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Indeed. Is it possible that:

The only possible reason that [name of famous YEC speaker/writer goes here] adopted a Young Earth Creationist position was to try and win favor with mainstream fundamentalists.

Is that statement equally fair?

Even when I was a YEC speaker, I got sooooo tired of this “they just became an evolutionist to win favor” trope. It’s lame and needs to be retired after more than a half century of robotic use. Attempting to pin one’s opponent with a negative motivation is a classic logic fallacy. It is popular rhetoric—and all too often very effective—with general audiences who don’t recognize the fallacy but it fails with anyone who ever had a year or so of undergraduate logic courses or who likes to apply common sense. In this version, the logic error is a combination of the Genetic Fallacy and the Ad Hominem Fallacy. In popular usage, it can also be labelled poisoning the well.

Of course, in using this fallacy based on presumptions of personal motivation, the guilty party—yes, I’m talking about you, @r_speir—claims to know another person’s inner’s thoughts and therefore their motivations. You claim to know that someone affirms evolution because they either fear the consequences of not affirming it and/or they want the advantages of affirming evolution. You also assume that an “unsavory” motivation somehow taints and cancels out all other motivations (such as valuing evidence and truth.)

The argument is silly and trite. Young Earth Creationist speakers and writers need to abandon it.
Meanwhile, it is a reminder of my parody song lyric for a silly Hee Haw song I mentioned on another thread just a few days ago:

“If it weren’t for bad arguments, I’d have no arguments at all.
Gloom, bad logic, and disinformation on me.”

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In the meantime, after all the noise dies down, no one has yet reversed my proposal. R Rauser is hereby invited - as are you all - to deal with the physical ramifications of what I have proposed. I always welcome falsification of my ideas.

If you are unable to do it, and equally unable to admit that YECs may have a valid point regarding a literal take on Genesis 1, then I wonder if you can at least do the honest thing and cease asserting that you evolutionists and Bible revisionists have the only viable interpretations, because that is simply not a fact, and if you keep claiming it, you are spreading falsehoods.

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Meantime and noise are all rhetorical devices to minimize real issues which you ignore.

I’ve been watching how you write and respond. You are, as others have pointed out here, very good with your rhetoric. You deflect major issues by focusing upon the minors and ignore big questions like those posed above. Not that they are magnanimous issues, but rather that they are basic responses to your own replies to others, and they call into question the efficacy of your positions and your replies.

You state plainly, as though it is fact, that others are wrong and then fail to respond when you are called out. This is disingenuous. I hope that people see this clearly. I care not one iota about any conversation with you. I care about the silent readers who come here truly seeking the truth.

Everyone admits that YECs have a valid point regarding a literal take on Genesis 1. The text says “days”… YECs have a valid point that the most natural reading of Genesis 1 is that the earth was created in seven days. When compared to the physical reality, there is no basis for maintaining this silly position, despite any assertions you make.

What falsehoods are being spread? You make a strong accusation here. Please clarify exactly which falsehoods you are accusing those responding to you of making.

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When Ego and Creation Science Meet

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I would modify that slightly to:

YECs have a valid point that the most natural reading of most English translations of Genesis 1 is that the earth was created in seven days.

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@r_speir – I just posted this last night:

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@r_speir – My God is sovereign over atoms and molecules. How about yours?

Now, @r_speir, do you want to make accusations about my motives for accepting evolutionary science?!

P.S. – I’m a little angry.

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@r_speir: My God is sovereign over atoms and molecules. How about yours?

In case you didn’t figure it out, the kidney account demonstrates that God is sovereign over the when and where of the molecules in my kidneys, not to mention the when and the where of my bleed, the phone calls, the devotional, the date, EVERYTHING!

Including evolution.

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Wow. Not right at all. You would have to supply examples to make your case. People here get frustrated with me not because I do not answer, but in fact because I do answer and I give good answers. Since my answers are not what they want to hear, they decide that I am not really giving answers at all - this is entirely false.

Whew, you just missed my biggest point made in this very thread. You are so wrong here. It is precisely the physical aspects of my proposal that you cannot overturn.

You bet I am. I clearly stated that the falsehood is when you claim and continue to claim that YECs don’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to literal Genesis creation days. Is that clear enough for you?

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You will have to deal with that one on your own. These kinds of discussions get everyone a little ruffled. I can’t help you there. But what I can reiterate is that you must stop the false accusations against YECs like they are some kind of unintelligent idiots. You must stop this, for one, because of threads just like this where I show your position is untenable. YECs make some good points, and it is high time you people start telling the truth about it.

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I haven’t seen any such accusation. Would you please quote one or withdraw your claim?

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You obviously don’t read well, especially my BioLogos post and my kidney account.

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Maybe you didn’t read the one about ego and creation science, either.

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Not everyone is making accusations about motivation, are they.