Daily Atheist Devotional #195 (Atheist Terrorist Edition)

I usually keep out of the atheist devotionals because I do believe that everyone deserves to express themselves in any way they see fit, but they don't usually add anything to my life, so I skip them. However, I was looking through the recent posts and happened to see this post you wrote, *****ie, and felt a need to respond.

According to reliable radiometric dating techniques used by geologists, the Earth is at least 4.5 billion years old (that's 4,500,000,000 years before present). This is based on measurements on outcrops of very ancient rocks (not fossils - a widely believed misconception!). But these rocks themselves were probably  derived from even older rocks which formed the first-formed continental crust. 

The Bible isn't specific about how old the earth is. Bishop Ussher, in a remarkably scholarly attempt well before the advent of modern day geological thinking, estimated the age of the Earth by counting up all the generations in the Old testament, plus a few adjustments here and there. He came up with a date for Genesis at just over 6000 years BC (that's 8000 years old.)



I highly recommend a book called, "Thank God for Evolution." It's a very interesting book and even if you read it and continued to believe as you do today, you'll get OTHER things from it, I promise. Michael Dowd is a Christian minister and he talks about how you CAN have a deep spiritual faith and STILL believe in scientific facts.

Here's an excerpt from his book:


“God," from an evolutionary standpoint, is nothing so trivial or inconsequential as a supreme landlord residing off the planet and outside the universe—an otherworldly entity whose primary business is engaging in unnatural acts (supernatural interventions). As I’m using the term, “God" cannot possibly be less than a sacred, proper name for Ultimate Reality, the largest nested whole—that One Supreme Reality which transcends yet includes all other realities and makes possible all forms of creativity. And because we are part of the whole and cannot get outside the whole to examine it, different peoples at different times, living in different parts of the world, reflecting on different plants, different animals, different terrain, and different climates, would inevitably have used different metaphors and analogies to describe the nature of this Ultimacy. Naturally, they would have told different stories about how to relate meaningfully to It/Him/Her. Understanding religious differences is hardly more complicated than comprehending this fact and pondering its implications.

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This thread is a good example of why we will probably never achieve world peace. It's unattainable because people don't even attempt to START to have tolerance. Until we get to a point when we can say, "OK, I see what you believe and while I don't adhere to those same beliefs, I respect your right to believe it."   Ya know, without punching, biting and kicking and all that "fun" stuff!  We're a warring bunch, stinky  humans!  

Nicci,

I think I am going to start calling *****ie, Spankie.  It is obvious that she is not getting enough of a verbal ass whuppin in church, so she comes here for more.

It's all part of the punching, biting and kicking that you mention.  Some like to punch and it seems that others like to be punched, so it all works out.