Or Ayala

Until the Mid XX Century, Catholic Theologians could read · Can't Have you Miss Rahner · Or Ayala

Ayala warned that theologians such as John O’Rourke (O’Rourke 1965) were inadequately informed about the consensus among geneticists concerning polygenism and that “from the point of view of the natural sciences only polygenism makes sense. Evolution does not happen in individuals, but in populations.” Furthermore, “There is no known mechanism by which the human species might have arisen by a single step in one or two individuals only, from whom the rest of mankind would have descended” (Ayala 1967, 15). Ayala concluded that Catholic theologians are confronted by a difficult dilemma.

Well, neither is there any known mechanism by which men could at all have descended from non-human ancestors.

If Atelerix Algirus and Hemiechinus auritus share a common ancestor, that common ancestor was a couple of hedgehogs on the Ark.

This kind of process of diversification cannot explain how mankind could arise from non-human kinds, any more than there is either proof or explanation of hedgehogs diversifying from non-hedgehogs.

Now, here we go Ayala, Robert G. North, René Lavocat.

Ayala

I can see only two possible alternate solutions for the Catholic theologian. One, to find an explanation which would make polygenism compatible with the doctrine of original sin – an explanation that, according to Pius XII, does not appear likely to be forthcoming. Two, to bring additional theological hypotheses in support of monogenism. Such hypotheses are not available from, and are consistently opposed by, the natural sciences (Ayala 1967, 16).

Robert G. North, SJ

Among those Ayala mentioned was Robert North who noted that polygenism had become such an integral aspect of evolutionary science that there was no scientific reason to expect any radically different process for the transition to Homo sapiens. North was a strong advocate of Teilhard’s ideas and credited him for helping to shift theological attention away from skepticism about polygenism to a more fundamental reconsid- eration of original sin doctrine (North 1963). Furthermore, the theological status of monogenism was unclear. “Is it a truth of revelation? Is it a fact of partially human knowledge, yet genuinely certain and therefore of itself unalterable? Is it a reformable decree of authority? No one can claim a consensus of experts for his answer today” (North 1967, 57).

René Lavocat

Abbé René Lavocat was sympathetic to North’s assessment. As Director of the Laboratoire de Paléontologie des Vertébrés at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in Montpellier, he agreed with the scientific consensus that human origins took place through gradual genetic changes in a population and not due to an “exceptional mutation” in one or two individuals (Lavocat 1967a, 584). ... He also interpreted Humani generis as an invitation to investigate how polygenism might be compatible with innovative theological understanding of original sin.

Well, no. This is to orthodox theology what a media personality close to Bud Light is to decent clothing and behaviour.

Apart from the gross reinterpretation of the outright ban into an invitation, we have the despair of considering factuality of the Biblical account as even possible, and an adulation before consensus, if between today's scientists. And the solutions.

Then we have Hoger Katechetisch Instituut of Nijmegen. Schoonberg, Schillebeeckx ...

At first sight it seems that his intention is to stress the fact that it was through one man that sin came into the world. But the repetition of the word “one”, occasioned by the view of the world history as it existed in Paul’s time, is only part of the literary dress, not the message. What this difficult passage teaches is that though sin and death ruled over mankind, grace and eternal life, the restoration, has come in greater abundance through Jesus (A New Catechism 1967, 262).

There were no supporting arguments, because there was no attack. All sides of the Renaissance conflict were describing Adam and Eve as a real couple and Genesis 3 as a historic account.

Asking why Trentine Fathers, if they intended monogenism to be understood as doctrinal in the first three canons of decree one of session five, did not give supporting argument is to forget:

• everyone took it for granted
• it was used as supporting argument for the doctrine.
• a series of canons is not a discussion.

It's like asking Lavocat to give supporting arguments for taking the scientific consensus for granted. Which in a sense I do, of course, but not for believing him he really reasons from that as from a foundation of intellectual, not just cultural backdrop, only for asking him why I should believe him. An attitude he cannot take with Trent, obviously./HGL

Can't Have you Miss Rahner

Until the Mid XX Century, Catholic Theologians could read · Can't Have you Miss Rahner · Or Ayala

Hoffmann has this to say:

Karl Rahner was not deterred by the pope’s introductory warning and in fact used the ensuing symposium as the occasion to report that he had changed his mind and no longer considered polygenism to be theologically objectionable. He summarized his new perspective in a 1967 essay and expanded it for a 1970 publication in which he commented that Paul VI’s speech had not prevented the symposium participants from considering polygenism compatible with original sin doctrine. As he wrote in December of 1967:

The question of polygenism within Catholic theology may with all due respect for the interpretation of Humani Generis be treated as still open. There is certainly no dogma of monogenism. Cautious theological reflection enables us to show today that Trent’s dogma of original sin does not exclude polygenism. The two can coexist. On this point I have reappraised my own earlier view (Rahner 1967a, xii).

Rahner presented his new position as a thesis to be defended.

In the present state of theology and natural science, it cannot be demonstrated with certainty that polygenism is incompatible with the orthodox doctrine of original sin. Therefore, it is preferable and more prudent that the magisterium refrain from censuring polygenism (Rahner 1970, 185).

Rahner explained that he used a negative formulation because polygenism is a scientific hypothesis that cannot be deduced theologically. He offered two polygenetic hypotheses as legitimate settings for the occurrence of original sin. One possibility was that a single individual sinned and thereby blocked “the grace-transmitting function” of the entire human population. This was essentially the process he had hypothetically discussed in 1954 and then discarded as incompatible with the teachings of Trent unless the propagation of sin transpires in a manner other than through physical descent, a possibility he now accepted. Rahner also suggested another option that would involve a collective sin so that Adam represents “the concrete expression used for that one group,” the population that caused “the consequences which traditional teaching attaches to this sin” (Rahner 1967b, 71).

"There is certainly no dogma of monogenism."
Well, there is at the very least a taking for granted of monogenism in the context of dogma.

"Cautious theological reflection enables us to show today that Trent’s dogma of original sin does not exclude polygenism."
Cautious? Or highly incautious?

"In the present state of theology and natural science, it cannot be demonstrated with certainty that polygenism is incompatible with the orthodox doctrine of original sin."
But in the previous state, in the times of Haydock, it could?

Is theology regressing as science progresses?

The allegation is reminiscent of the certainly unfair quip about "God of the gaps" ... but it is provoked by attitudes such as Rahner's ...

If the quip is not fair to Catholic theology, it is fair to Rahner.

"He offered two polygenetic hypotheses as legitimate settings for the occurrence of original sin."

All ears ...

"One possibility was that a single individual sinned and thereby blocked “the grace-transmitting function” of the entire human population. This was essentially the process he had hypothetically discussed in 1954 and then discarded as incompatible with the teachings of Trent unless the propagation of sin transpires in a manner other than through physical descent, a possibility he now accepted."

"Unless the propagation of sin transpires in a manner other than physical descent"

Which is how it was always understood. We are ented into the sin of Adam by our physical descent. We are ented into the righteousness of Christ by Baptism. Propagatio is from:

1) the breeding of specimens of a plant or animal by natural processes from the parent stock.
"the propagation of plants by root cuttings"

In other words, allowing propagation to proceed by other means than physical descent means, it is not propagation.

But what about the next sense?

2) the action of widely spreading and promoting an idea, theory, etc.
"a life devoted to the propagation of the Catholic faith"

This would fall into "imitatione" ... something denied by Trent V.

So, option one by Rahner is out.

Rahner also suggested another option that would involve a collective sin so that Adam represents “the concrete expression used for that one group,” the population that caused “the consequences which traditional teaching attaches to this sin”

In fact, collective sins are individual sins. If no individual of a whole collective sins, the collective doesn't sin. One tends to speak of collective sins as in the fact of others already sinning being a weakening of one's resolve not to sin, and therefore a mitigation of individual responsibility. This could not happen if one was not already weakened before that by original sin. Collective sins cannot explain the original one.

This is also the response or a second response to the first one.

"One possibility was that a single individual sinned and thereby blocked “the grace-transmitting function” of the entire human population."

The one thing we do know about the original grace-transmitting function is that it would have been by propagation. This is sth only parents could block in relation to children, and for it to be blocked for all children, for the entire mankind, the parents doing it need to be the original single parent couple or even a single parent.

But I think the idea is about how in the Church today, certainly not on the level of the Church universal, but on the level of a parish or a diocese, the sin of one man could indeed block the grace transmitting function of the Church. In the Church, grace is transmitted sacramentally. A man could invalidate his sacraments or tie them to evil conditions that block the grace, if he were curate or bishop. However, this is to recall, God can confer His grace without the viciated sacraments, and as long as the sin in superiors is limited locally, it can be corrected from the outside. Similarily, parallel to parents (going back to the more Catholic version, for a moment) blocking grace for their children by their sins, there would be graces not blocked by parents, there would be parallel tribes of immortals with no sin tainting them.

The problem with this model is, we receive grace through sacraments instead of first from parents and then from walking directly with God, only due to Adam's sin. A condition following from its completion in effect, cannot explain what it is in its origin. Hence, this model too for polygenism is off too, even heavily so. A condition that's God's medicine for the fall cannot be one which preceded the fall and therefore and explains it.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Pentecost*
28.V.2023

* Will be published on May 29th, Pentecost Monday

Until the Mid XX Century, Catholic Theologians could read

Until the Mid XX Century, Catholic Theologians could read · Can't Have you Miss Rahner · Or Ayala

The decree further asserted that “this sin of Adam, –which in its origin is one (origine unum), and being transfused into all by propagation (propagatione), not by imitation (imitatione), is in each one as his own.” Additional theo- logical reflection is needed to determine whether these references to Adam as “the first man” might be implicit or co-defined by the doctrine at stake or are simply a non-doctrinal mode of expression. Until the mid-twentieth century, the preferred interpretation was that this phrase, used together with the terminology propagatione and origine unum, implies a unique sinful act with effects that are transmitted to all humanity through direct physical descent from Adam, the first human.

Catholicism and Evolution: Polygenism and Original Sin
JAMES R. HOFMANN
California State University Fullerton
https://www.tradicatolica.com/file/si2079177/Catholicism-and-Evolutionism.-Polygenism-and-Original-Sin-fi33106729.pdf

The present situation amounts to a quandary for theologians. On the one hand, even though it has not been formally addressed by the magisterium since Humani generis, monogenism continues to be accepted as a basic premise in Church teaching, as is shown by the relevant sections of the The Catechism of the Catholic Church (nn. 374–379, 390, 399–407). On the other hand, to deny the polygenistic origin of the human species places the theologian in clear opposition with science, and conjures up the image of an obscurantist faith combating the truth of reason. And yet it may very well prove to be that science, in its forthright drive for empirical knowledge, has only forced theology to deeper reflection on its own central claim that Christ lies at the heart of all (McMahon 2003).

• How long ago can a Church teaching have been stated centrally and it still be binding? When will we get reassurings that Nicaea against Arius is still binding?
• Have they even tried the Creationist solution?

The goal of the present paper is to clarify how this longstanding “quandary” took root and became established. In the tradition of drawing comparisons between Catholic responses to evolution and heliocentrism, it is tempting to construct an analogy using Galileo and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin as protagonists. Although that exercise might be informative, it ultimately loses traction because for polygenism there is no iconic public event of comparable notoriety when measured against the trial of Galileo. Instead of placing a focus on a representative individual, the present paper has a broader conceptual basis.

Oh, you actually mean, you don't find Teilhard as at the original sin of Polygenism? Or that he is treated as representative of a larger number of first sinnerS?

Wait ... you mean, being a Polygenist is actually OK?

I think, this search says it all./HGL

To be continued on: Can't Have you Miss Rahner, Or Ayala

Did Pentecost Reverse Babel?

• If it comes to repentance reversing sin, yes.
• But understanding of tongues does not reverse creation of them.

Town, Not Temple

Some would perhaps argue as one discrepancy between Göbekli Tepe and the Biblical criteria for the Babel of Genesis 10 and 11 that GT was a temple, Babel was a city. Watch this still from Curious Being:

Link: Göbekli Tepe and its “Handbags”: Latest Excavation Results Reveal a Whole New Story
Curious Being, 12 May 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5sGNc99JoQ

Two more clips:

"13000 YEARS OF BEER HISTORY" - Not Really

2666 B. Chr.

35.4608 pmC, so dated as 11 216 B. Chr.

"11000 B.C." DISCOVERY OF BEER

Natufian Hunters Gatherers (Israel) settle to grow grain, brew beer and create the first civilizations. This is Neolithic time.

2644 B. Chr.

38.0408 pmC, so dated as 10 644 B. Chr.

2621 B. Chr.

40.6138 pmC, so dated as 10 071 B. Chr.

"10000 B.C."

First production of bread.

2607 B. Chr.

42.8224 pmC, so dated as 9607 B. Chr.

2041 B. Chr.

76.6964 pmC, so dated as 4241 B. Chr.

"4100 B.C."

Discovery of wine.

2019 B. Chr.

77.8962 pmC, so dated as 4069 B. Chr.

1996 B. Chr.

79.0927 pmC, so dated as 3946 B. Chr.

"3900 B.C." THE HYMN TO NINKASI

The world's oldest known beer recipe comes from a poem (Mesopotamia).

1974 B. Chr.

80.2859 pmC, so dated as 3774 B. Chr.

1566 B. Chr.

97.441 pmC, so dated as 1776 B. Chr.

"1754 B.C." HAMMURABI'S CODE

The oldest law code defines rules concerning growing, harvesting and selling grain and brewing beer!

1543 B. Chr.

97.813 pmC, so dated as 1723 B. Chr.

So, c. 2655 BC + 2023 AD = c. 4678 years of history.

The "discovery of wine" is too late in archaeology, we will probably somewhere in West Armenia find Noah's vineyeard, before 2607 BC, i e before "9600 BC" carbon dated./HGL

Could Pius XII claim assent of opinion to "the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid" in § 36?

Carl Wieland Used Two Bad Arguments · How Close is the Jimmy Akin Model to the Urantia Book? · Could Pius XII claim assent of opinion to "the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid" in § 36?

Here is* § 20:

20. Nor must it be thought that what is expounded in Encyclical Letters does not of itself demand consent, since in writing such Letters the Popes do not exercise the supreme power of their Teaching Authority. For these matters are taught with the ordinary teaching authority, of which it is true to say: "He who heareth you, heareth me";[3] and generally what is expounded and inculcated in Encyclical Letters already for other reasons appertains to Catholic doctrine. But if the Supreme Pontiffs in their official documents purposely pass judgment on a matter up to that time under dispute, it is obvious that that matter, according to the mind and will of the Pontiffs, cannot be any longer considered a question open to discussion among theologians.

So, that's a scope in which encyclicals can claim assent.

• expounding a doctrine already taught traditionally
• deciding on a doctrine previously debated.

Does § 36 do that ?

36. For these reasons the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter - for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God. However, this must be done in such a way that the reasons for both opinions, that is, those favorable and those unfavorable to evolution, be weighed and judged with the necessary seriousness, moderation and measure, and provided that all are prepared to submit to the judgment of the Church, to whom Christ has given the mission of interpreting authentically the Sacred Scriptures and of defending the dogmas of faith.[11] Some however, rashly transgress this liberty of discussion, when they act as if the origin of the human body from pre-existing and living matter were already completely certain and proved by the facts which have been discovered up to now and by reasoning on those facts, and as if there were nothing in the sources of divine revelation which demands the greatest moderation and caution in this question.

• Pius XII is not expounding one doctrine, but leaving two options kind of open
• one of them ("Adam's body had biological ancestry") is not traditionally taught
• the options had not been debated for long, and quite a few had already been condemned or risked being it for saying that "Adam's body had biological ancestry" or even leaving the option open
  
  
  • St. George Mivart had been condemned
  • John Augustine Zahm could have had his book condemned but pulled back.

Here is wiki on Fr. Zahm:

Between 1891-96, he published multiple books and articles on the topic, culminating with Evolution and Dogma in 1896.[7]

In this text, as in his others, Zahm argued that Roman Catholicism could fully accept an evolutionary view of biological systems, as long as this view was not centered around Darwin's theory of natural selection. After the Vatican decided to censure the book in 1898, Zahm fully accepted this rebuttal and pulled away from any writing concerning the relationship of theology and science.[4]

In other words, as Fr Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange OP had argued, since he drafted the encyclical, the question was already decided, and was no longer a question open to discussion among theologians. So, when Trads of any stripe say one need not obey post-Vatican II Popes, on a certain issue, because they are going against or encouraging by licences subjects to go against what was already decided, whether the conclusion is, they are no longer Popes or had never been Popes, or the conclusion is, the papacy can right now not be relied on, Pius XII is open to the same criticism.

There is also another reason why the leaving of two options open cannot oblige, namely, this is what Pope Honorius did, forbidding polemics between the two positions, therefore criticism of the Monothelite one. But this is exactly what his successor Pope St. Leo II condemned him for.

An act which is infallibly condemned as bad cannot be an act which was obliging just before it was condemned. But if you reply that Pope St. Leo II condemned the act only 50 years later, when experience had shown the will to peace which on some level probably prompted it just would not work, I think a similar answer can be given about Humani Generis. It was 73 years ago, or 72 and some, it has been replaced by a fairly great hostility against the traditional position starting 30 years ago, by "John Paul II" misreading what was said as a definite definition of theological licitness, and those holding the traditional position risk being taken to task via mental health operations approved by the ecclesial adherents of the new position. That's about as far from the open or half open debate proposed in the words of Pius XII that one can get.

So, should one desire to use the criterium of assent needed even for non-definitive papal teaching, as the Introibo blogger exposes it against Feeneyism** in order to absolutify the very relative and intermediate acceptance Pius XII extended to the Evolutionist view, one should first ask, whether a mere acceptance can be an enunciation, and then if the certainly disciplinary measure can not be a culpable one, and one already proven wrong by its bad fruits. Today, Catholics are not united on who is the correct Pope.

He gives a paragraph deserving of further analysis, beyond the scope of accepting Deep Time:

The day may come when an opinion of this kind needs to be modified. The Church Herself allows for this possibility by not proclaiming it as definitive and binding for all time. The holding of this opinion will possibly be seen as no longer necessary for the purity of the faith. The labors of the approved theologians will, in large part, be responsible for this development.

I think this - the part of "approved theologians" - is partly echoing his idea that only approved theologians may make judgements, by syllogising from known Catholic doctrine, laymen just shouldn't. However, I do not find this part in Humani Generis. However, by "in large part" he is at least not denying the possibility of engaged laymen being involved. If submitting theological material to the Pope and not getting it condemned for error is an approval, and if Pope Michael was Pope, I could count as both.

The modifications of these declarations, when and if such modification ever comes, in no way violates the infallibility or Indefectibility of the Church since the doctrine in question was never presented as infallible and irreformable teaching.

For those claiming the Catholic Church contradicts itself by belief in the Immaculate Conception, which was generally (very barely) denied in the West up to the time of St. Thomas, it can be noted these denials did not come from Popes, as far as I can tell. It is possible Duns Scotus had it from a school in Paris, starting out when a French king is married to a princess from Kiev. The East was more strongly for the Immaculate Conception.

From another paragraph:

The Church also cannot impose evil disciplines, and thereby prescribe something evil to the faithful, making it sinful to observe; nor can the Church give anything which would constitute an incentive to impiety.

This should be enough for those who pretend the discipline of the centuries long former 14 / 12 limit was objectively disordered as to marital age.***

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
Octave of Ascension
25.V.2023

Notes:

* Vatican : ENCYCLICAL HUMANI GENERIS
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_12081950_humani-generis.html

** This is where I learn that Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange drafted Humani Generis:

Introibo Ad Altare Dei : "But It's Not Infallible:" Another Feeneyite Folly
https://introiboadaltaredei2.blogspot.com/2023/05/but-its-not-infallible-another.html

*** As I have myself argued here:

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : I Still Advocate for a Lowering of Marriageable Age, Cases in Point, the Blessed Virgin and the mother of St. Francis of Sales
https://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2023/05/i-still-advocate-for-lowering-of.html

How Close is the Jimmy Akin Model to the Urantia Book?

Carl Wieland Used Two Bad Arguments · How Close is the Jimmy Akin Model to the Urantia Book? · Could Pius XII claim assent of opinion to "the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid" in § 36?

To Jimmy Akin, a convert to Catholicism from Calvinism, and professing at least on some level to not have forsaken the faith since, Adam and Eve were possibly ancestral to all who live now, but far from our only ancestors alive in roughly speaking "their generation" there were in fact at least 10 000 pairs or individuals, as this is considered the minimum viable population or minimum population for genetic viability.

But if so, their sin affected the rest, as they were their "federal head" - with them not being our only ancestors in their generation, they cannot be the ancestral head of all mankind, as the traditional doctrine posits.

Now, look at this from the Urantia Foundation:

Far from the simplistic fable from the Bible, the story of Adam and Eve is a complicated one, and not well-understood by most of the world as yet. In The Urantia Book, we are given a complete picture of this amazing series of events—the mission of Adam and Eve was actually the third of five epochal revelations to our planet…

The human descendents of Adam and Eve sprang partially from the two children that were conceived as a result of default—Cain and Sansa.

Cain was, in reality, the son of Eve and Cano, and Sansa was the daughter of Adam and Laotta. Both Cano and Laotta were human beings—not members of the Violet race to which Adam and Eve belonged. If you have read this story (in the link above), you may recall that the liaison of Eve with Cano meant the default of the Adamic mission. When Adam realized what Eve had done, he “sought out Laotta, the brilliant Nodite woman who was head of the western schools of the Garden, and with premeditation committed the folly of Eve.” And these were the acts which effectively defaulted their mission and doomed both Adam and Eve to their degradation to mortal status.

If all had gone according to the divine plan, Adam and Eve would have procreated between themselves, and then their children would have procreated with each other (this was safe for them, and standard practice, as they were a pure-line race) until their numbers had reached one million. Following this milestone, the pure-line children of Adam and Eve would have begun procreating with the higher races of humanity then living on the earth. In this way the Material Sons and Daughters upstep the biological systems of the races, both physically and spiritually, through their life plasm. And this is the mission of an Adam and Eve to an evolutionary planet such as ours. Theirs is a mission of physical, intellectual, and spiritual upliftment to the evolutionary races of mankind. They are sent from celestial government as a revelation from God, and as biologic uplifters.

Their FAQ, Q: How could there be be descendants from Adam and Eve, if there were only 2 sons mentioned, and if there were sisters, how could they multiply within the same family?

Parallels with Jimmy Akin:

• already a biologically human population on earth before them
• produced by some kind of evolution
• with Adam and Eve enjoying a very special position among age peers
• the Biblical story being a simplification to the point of not being historically truthful as we see historically truthful

But there are also differences, like Jimmy Akin having:

• no affirmation of racism*
• no pretense of getting this from a special post-Biblical revelation by an UFO.

Given that the Urantia book is denying the identity of Jesus with God the Son, we can be glad for Jimmy Akin not getting his cue from that source.

But if Satan can masquerade as an angel of light, is it only through false revelations, and can it never be through intellectual heresies?

Here are some differences of the Bible from the Urantia Book, where Jimmy Akin falls on the Biblical side:

• no affirmation of racism
• no pretense of getting this from a special post-Biblical revelation by an UFO.

And here are some differences of the Bible (taken in the obvious sense and with obvious implications) both from Jimmy Akin and from the Urantia book, in its affirmations about Adam and Eve:

• no biologically human populations on earth before them
• human population from them who in turn were created directly as morphological adults
• they had only descendants, no generation peers
• the Biblical story being partly by them and historically truthful

What if the theory of genetic viability depending on so many is wrong, and even more wrong if applied to our first parents, created without any genetic defects? What if a man writing 4000 pages in a trance whether controlled by Satan or left to one's own prejudices was not much worse than the "science" Jimmy Akin relies on? And if some should cease asking** where I have adherence to the Biblical story as factual from, and start asking where they have an adherence to it being not strictly factual from?
/Hans Georg Lundahl

* See phrases like "the races, while biologically fit, had never been purged of their retarded and defective strains." Pretty close to eugenic prejudice prevalent among Darwinists at the time. ** If they are asking that.

Carl Wieland Used Two Bad Arguments

Carl Wieland Used Two Bad Arguments · How Close is the Jimmy Akin Model to the Urantia Book? · Could Pius XII claim assent of opinion to "the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid" in § 36?

Here is his article, it's reposted "today" on CMI (actually tomorrow's date, but it's already tomorrow's date in Australia), here:

Has an ape learned to talk?
by Carl Wieland | This article is from
Creation 25(3):52–53, June 2003
https://creation.com/has-an-ape-learned-to-talk

Here is bad argument 1:

An ape’s larynx simply does not have that capability. For example, it can’t make the fundamental vowels (a, o, i, etc.) of the human language.

The reason this is irrelevant for capacity for language, as such, rather than for a specific* language, is, languages have different sound palettes. The sound that apes most audibly make would count as vowels. Not differentiated, fundamental vowels, but nevertheless vowels. One human language seems to have only two phonematically different vowels (though lots of versions made pertinent as per stress and surrounding consonants), so, having only one is not an obstacle to human language as such, only to human languages that we have.

But it can be completed into a fairly good argument against apes learning language anyway. Here is how.

Human language has three basic levels. The full sentense, usually breaks down into more than one morpheme. The morpheme, usually breaks down into more than one phoneme. And finally the phoneme. The full sentence or phrase makes the complete sense of a message. The morpheme by itself makes the incomplete sense of a message component like a concept or metaconcept. The phoneme by itself makes no sense, but differentiates morphemes that make different sense. But this means, the phonemes have to be a repertoir.

Now, differentiating vowels is out for the reason that Carl Wieland mentioned.

Differentiating consonants is also out for another reason, the ape's ear captures so low frequencies that hearing certain consonants is impossible.

Now, bad argument 2:

When many deaf children in Nicaragua were raised together in an environment without any spoken language input, they spontaneously developed their own highly complex sign language, complete with rules of grammar and syntax.

This is Communist fake news.

In fact, they had all had some input of at least improvised sign language from their homes, meaning they had been exposed to language input.

What they did was only equallising this into a common language.

The fake news foregoes the fact that children growing up without any human language input at all, during the relevant years, will grow bodily, but will not later be able to catch up with learning human language. If the growing up with beasts occurs after language acquisition has already taken place, the child will recover language if taken to human environments. But if the language acquisition had not yet taken place ...

Meet the 8-year-old girl raised by monkeys
By Gabrielle Fonrouge, April 6, 2017 10:33am
https://nypost.com/2017/04/06/meet-the-8-year-old-girl-raised-by-monkeys/

Two of these had already learned language, apparently the ten year old boy who had been with goats only two years, certainly the first, who didn't come in with capuchin monkeys before five, and one may have been rescured just in time, but for the other three it looks bleak in these cases:

The Week : 6 cases of children being raised by animals
https://theweek.com/articles/471164/6-cases-children-being-raised-by-animals

huck : 'FERAL CHILDREN': ABANDONED BY PARENTS AND RAISED BY ANIMALS
Friday 10 March, 2017, Text by Michael Segalov, Photography by Julia Fullerton-Batten
https://www.huckmag.com/article/stories-feral-children-abandoned-nature-raised-animals

If human babies could develop real language on their own, then Chomsky's atheist** view on human development would be viable. Once mutations had developed the human brain into a certain direction, that brain could, via toddlers creating their talk together, create human language.

This is not so. Barring miracles, and God creating a full grown Adam with a full grown not just language capacity, but even language mastery, that counts as a miracle, the only way for a human baby to acquire human language is via surroundings already having such, and this at very specific times in the baby's development, the transition, basically from baby to toddler. And this is precisely what mutations cannot provide. The human brain already has what's necessary, and feral children still don't learn language when rescued, unless they get rescued a short while after getting feral, or they got into this situation when already toddlers and having some speech. This is a nail in the coffin, not just for Atheistic Evolution, as it is impossible, but for Theistic Evolution too, as it would have made God cruel to His image Adam, before he sinned.

But some medical doctors have a certain degree of professionally conditioned Dunning Kruger about certain subjects outside medicine proper.
/Hans Georg

* It would be relevant for specific languages, but researchers could try to create vowel-poor dialects of these.
** While Chomsky is himself agnostic, while his view has been labelled as "creationist" by fellow Evolution believers, his view on how men became men is an atheistic view insofar as if God existed, on this view, He would be irrelevant.

"thy dwelling place" 3 Kings 8:30

Where Did Jesus Go? · "thy dwelling place" 3 Kings 8:30

That thou mayest hearken to the supplication of thy servant and of thy people Israel, whatsoever they shall pray for in this place, and hear them in the place of thy dwelling in heaven; and when thou hearest, shew them mercy.

Someone writing CMI, a D. S. from Brazil, states this is uncreated:

since 1 Kings* 8:30 says it’s God’s dwelling place and, therefore, eternal, not created.

What does the Bible mean by “heaven of heavens”?
Feedback archive → Feedback 2023
https://creation.com/heaven-of-heavens

I am here not going into the response of Keaton Halley, but simply stating, this is wrong.

God in and of His eternal nature cannot need a dwelling place. He is perfectly corporeal. His dwelling place is where He sits as in a throne room. In the Old Testament, God resided as in a theophany. He was adored by angels, right there, the pearly gates being closed to men, since Adam sinned. In the New Testament, since Ascension, Christ in His human nature is present on this throne. He is adored by the Blessed Virgin Mary, risen like Her Son, by angels, by the souls of faithful awaiting to be present also in body, once they are resurrected.

Hence, the dwelling place of which 3 Kings 8:30 speaks is not just created, but material and in three dimensional space./HGL

* A certain text mass was by the Jews divided into Samuel and Kings, two books, then by Christians into four books, first to fourth Kings. Since first and second Kings are what the Jews called Samuel, the Protestants call them first and second Samuel, and renumber the remainder as "first and second" instead of third and fourth Kings.

Science and Scientific Method

Is this science?

LiveScience : 1.7 billion Tyrannosaurus rexes walked the Earth before going extinct, new study estimates
News, By Harry Baker, 17.V.2023
https://www.livescience.com/animals/dinosaurs/17-billion-tyrannosaurus-rexes-walked-the-earth-before-going-extinct-new-study-estimates

In April 2021, a study published in the journal Science estimated that up to 2.5 billion T. rex individuals lived between 68 and 65.5 million years ago, whenroamed Earth. But a new study, published April 18 this year in the journal Palaeontology, has challenged that number, suggesting the actual figure is probably closer to 1.7 billion.

Do you know how much actual observed remains we have of T. Rex?

30 complete skeleta, plus lots of stray smaller bones.

That is what I recall from the site Palaeocritti. Now, the story is, it once was a paid site, and I enjoyed it. I came to know, perhaps they announced it on their site, that they were no longer paying as per 2016, and the site would close down. I obtained from Nobu Tamura the right to make a salvage blog, but by the end of 2016, I thought the work was needed no more. See here:

Palaeocritti Blog : Good News!
https://palaeocritti.blogspot.com/2016/11/good-news.html

Today, I wanted to go to the google site, remaining, unpaid, to verify the 30 skeleta, after writing above beginning of the essay mentioning them. I got a little shock:

Palaeocritti Blog : Bad News
https://palaeocritti.blogspot.com/2023/05/bad-news.html

Now, it is true, Palaeofieldguide is still up, but it is less precise, saying about T. Rex only "several skeletons" ...

But I think, even with the skeleta being "several" instead of precisely 30, we are very far from the claim of 1.7 or the other claim of 2.5 billion. This kind of extrapolation is to my best estimate not actually science.

Now, some will pretend that at least we have it from the scientific method. Therefore we should trust it, as the scientific method is where we get useful things from. The people who think like this should really watch a video called "the Engineering Method" ... it overdoes the lack of science, notably geometrical, by Medieval Cathedral builders, but it will at least show "modern science" as per after the "Scientific Revolution" is far from necessary for actually getting things done, and done well:

Building a Cathedral without Science or Mathematics: The Engineering Method Explained
engineerguy, 9 May 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ivqWN4L3zU

So, what were you saying again about us needing to trust science, because "scientific method" because that's the one and only thing providing useful knowledge? Nah, not really!/HGL

Where Did Jesus Go?

Where Did Jesus Go? · "thy dwelling place" 3 Kings 8:30

I live a somewhat stressed life. I arrived to the Nanterre University Library a bit before 11, found it closed and realised, it is Ascension Day.

I had a little feast.

In the cyber, I am now ready to write the challenge to Heliocentrics that passed through my head when I realised it was Ascension.

Where did Jesus leave from? Mount of Olives.

Where did He arrive?

Here are some answers that do not really make much sense for a Catholic.

"Into a space ship"

Makes perfect sense to a Raelian or a New Ager, but that is hardly the position of a Catholic.

"Nowhere, He was resumed into a mode of Godhood only, as before the Incarnation"

This impugns the Incarnation. Christ did not cease to be human or cease to have a human, glorified, body, which is not a "spirit body" that's so "spiritual" it can be nowhere, when He rose or when He ascended.

The Incarnation doesn't get cancelled.

"Into another dimension"

I actually quit Palmarian Church back in late 2002 over a quote from the Palmarian catechism, provided by a Sedevacantist friend.

"The Antichrist sees the world from the fourth dimension, the Very Pure Virgin (Virgen Purísima) from the eighth dimension."

To St. Augustine, there are three dimensions of space. Not four, not eight. Just as there are Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity Who created space.

"Into another world"

Like, Narnia or Charn being other universes, separate projects of creation, in CSL's very famous fiction.

This is less obnoxious, insofar as Bishop Tempier condemned the proposition that the First Cause (i e God) could not make more than one world.

VI:9 (34). Quod causa prima non posset plures mundos facere.

34 is the listing in Bishop Tempier's original condemnation on Laetare Sunday in early 1277 (or late 1276, as they put New Year at 25 March or April 1st back then), and in the English retake, it's in chapter VI errores de deo. It's proposition 9 of that chapter.

However, this is still not what Christians have traditionally held.

"The Eucharist shows ..."

that Christ can be miraculously and in a sense exceptionally present in a place through the dimensions of another thing, transsubstantiated into His body or blood, but it presupposes there is some other place where Christ is under His own dimensions. If He's king of Heaven, arguably the foot measure in heaven is 1/6 of His body length, so where six heavenly feet of His body touch six heavenly feet of the surrounding space in Heaven.

"But where is that?"

According to St. Thomas, the Empyraean Heaven is a place, same three dimensions as ours, placed above the fix stars. I would, due to its Biblical name "heavenly Jerusalem" venture it is past whatever star thats just above Jerusalem, neither North or South and neither East or West of it, at a specific time.

The Heliocentrics obviously have a problem with that, as Heliocentrism makes the 0.76 arc seconds of α Centauri (analysed apart from the c. 20 arc seconds considered "aberration of starlight") into parallax, same star in same place observed from slightly different angles. How slight? 0.76 arc seconds = 0.000 000 586 42 of a full circle. This along with the supposition that Earth is what annually twice over moves twice the Astronomical Unit* to opposite sides of the Sun, rather than Sun doing it to opposite places in the Zodiac or Ecliptic plane, makes α Centauri c. 4 light years away, that kind of "info" about fairly many "close" stars leads to a correlation between apparent star size and distance and this leads (with some further assumptions, not necessarily inherent in Heliocentrism, but accepted by Heliocentric astronomers) to a "Milky Way galaxy" c. 88 000 light years across and this being only one of several galaxies. With Geocentrism, by contrast, we can have stars in the relevant sense, i e fix stars, 1 light day up, and that would be then slightly lower than the height of Heavenly Jerusalem above earth. That's where Christ went, that's where He is, that's where He will return from./HGL

* 150 million kilometres (93 million miles) or 8.3 light-minutes according to the wiki.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astronomical_unit

Quick One on CMI

Jesuit accommodation in relation to biblical chronology and Chinese history
by Andrew Sibley, This article is from
Journal of Creation 36(1):53–56, April 2022
https://creation.com/jesuit-accommodation-and-biblical-chronology

The Jesuit missionaries developed a policy of accommodation in relation to Chinese religious and cultural practices in the 17th century. The Order further received permission in AD 1637 to use the Septuagint, instead of the Latin Vulgate, to try and harmonize the biblical chronology with Chinese history.

The Roman Martyrology (for Dec 25) actually has a Septuagint based chronology, since Creation to Flood is 2242 years LXX for Genesis 5, and Flood to birth of Abraham is 942 years, LXX without the Second Cainan, for Genesis 11./HGL

PS, next day, two more quotes. With comments. First:

Without getting into a discussion over whether the Masoretic Text or the Septuagint provide the better chronology, the Jesuit motivation for preferring the Septuagint was not entirely pure, being based upon an accommodation to non-Christian beliefs.

We are dealing with:

• non-Christian beliefs about history and chronology;
• which unlike Egyptian and Sumerian king lists do not flatly contradict the Bible.

We do not deal with:

• non-Christian beliefs about the universe;
• which (unlike spirit beings moving stars) contradict Christian beliefs about the universe.

Why is the distinction an important one? Because for one, anything contradicting the Bible, as such, all text versions and therefore the original autograph of the hagiographer, is clearly in and of itself by that fact alone false. For another, history and chronology tend to be pretty easy to verify, even by non-Christians (and so are some of the items of cosmology, geocentrism being true and spirits moving celestial bodies, or the soul being immaterial and therefore immortal).

Second:

The China missionaries had gained permission from the Vatican in AD 1637 to use the longer chronology of the Greek Septuagint (LXX), instead of the Latin Vulgate that is based upon the Rabbinical Masoretic Text.

Actually, the Masoretic text is from AD 1000 and the Vulgate from AD c. 400. It is a matter of opinian whether St. Jerome had access to the Hebrew text as in being able to read it, or whether he was using Aquila of Sinope. However, it is very clear that the two earliest translations into Greek are the Septuagint and Aquila. The Septuagint was made by people who were waiting for Christ. Aquila made himself a disciple of rabbi Akiba who represented a Judaism which had already rejected the true promised one.

Now, two or three more things, without quotes.

• With all adaptations that Jesuits made to Chinese rituals, they kept the Catholic belief pure.
• The main harm done by Chinese Rites was by people hearing the one describe it (as does Sibley) as a concession to Pagan and erroneous beliefs, and seeing the other, a Jesuit, as a better friend. People started adapting to, not what the Jesuits did, but what their accusers thought they did.
• Their "adaptation" clearly allowed them to make all of Chinese history post-Flood, if not post-Babel (and "they" who "removed from the East" were arguably not all of mankind, but a global élite, keeping in touch with relatives ranging from Thogorma's to Regma's tribes and Jectan's too. The ones concluding against a global Flood were arguably more likely to come from people sharing the esteem for Chinese historiography and also not sharing the Septuagint solution.
• The secular learned men who were here cited as deviating from Biblical history, namely Vossius, Isaac La Peyrère, Giordano Bruno, were none of them Catholics in good standing with their written works too:
  
  
  • Vossius was a Protestant;
  • Isaac La Peyrère was a Jew, who shilly-shallied about converting to Protestantism or Catholicism, and his book was condemned, even if he was saving his soul, dying among Oratorian fathers in Aubervilliers;
  • Giordano Bruno was a Dominican lapsing from the faith who ended up on the stake in 1600, and Protestants and Freemasons have contributed much more than Catholics or specifically Jesuits to give him an undue influence.

PPS, as Sibley is attacking the fact of believing Pagan beliefs about their history, he is in fact attacking the basis for believing Christian history, including existence of Jesus or authorship of the Gospels or founding of a Church that recognised that authorship and the life of Her Founder, at once Divine and Human.

Because, beliefs about the public or otherwise accessible past is the bread and butter of how history is tested. I'll link to previous writings on diverse of the topics touched on in the comment or comments.
/HGL

You are Not Damned for Being Named Darwin

St. Paul had a friend who was called Apollo. And check out this:

Pope John II (Latin: Ioannes II; died 8 May 535), born Mercurius, was the bishop of Rome from 2 January 533 to his death. As a priest at St. Clement's Basilica, he endowed that church with gifts and commissioned stone carvings for it. Mercurius became the first pope to adopt a new Papal name upon his elevation to the office.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_II

So, you can be named, as a child, Mercury or Apollo ir Satan or Darwin, you are not damned for it.

You can even have a gematria adding up to 6-hundred-6-ty-6 and not be damned for that. The Antichrist will have that gematria, when it becomes clear he is the Antichrist, I already have a canditate whos's probable, but he will be damned for his deeds, not for his gematria.

However, I think it would be a grave sin to name your children Satan, and it would also be a grave sin to name them Darwin. Or is. A certain Aussie family was mildly chastised on vacation.

Riley Whitelum and Elayna Carausu and their children Darwin and Lenny.

Carausu said the family was unaware the monkeys could be so aggressive while spending time at the picturesque Thai beach.

Parhaps she thought monkeys and apes would be fairly civilised creatures, since "our close relatives"? A belief perhaps encapsuled when she named her boy Darwin? Or more strongly in Whitelum, if he took the initiative.

"I'm not kidding babe, they went for Darwin," Whitelum tells Carausu.
"Lenny literally said 'is it going to get me' and I said 'no mate, no' and then they just went for Darwin.
"I'm really glad the boys didn't get bitten."

Whitelum actually had a bite. Now here is the link:

Aussie family attacked by monkeys at popular beach in Thailand
By Savannah Meacham • Associate Producer, 5:50pm Mar 21, 2023
https://www.9news.com.au/world/australian-family-sailing-monkey-attack-monkey-beach-thailand/

Glad it wasn't their boat they named so ominously ill! God speed their sailing trip./HGL

Answering the "10 questions to ask a young earth creationist"

This post is pre-programmed for Inventio Crucis, May 3rd. I have given the link, and copied all of the ten questions by a "priest-in-charge at St Annes Woodplumpton" (who as Anglican isn't a priest), and am starting the answering today, the feast of St. Paul of the Cross (unlike Michael Roberts so far at least, he was a real priest in earthly life and is so for eternity). Each question is given the proper html only when answered - then it has a header in bold and is given as a blockquote./HGL

10 questions to ask a young earth creationist
13 November 2018, by Michael Roberts
https://www.premierunbelievable.com/topics/10-questions-to-ask-a-young-earth-creationist/12015.article

1. Can we start by agreeing that the Gospel is more about the Rock of Ages than the ages of rocks?

The centre of the Gospel is the crucified and risen Christ, and everything in the Old Testament leads up to that. Jesus, and not the age of my rock collection, is the heart of the Christian faith.

It's a Christological question whether He always spoke truly, or sometimes only subjectively truthfully, but deceived by a cultural wrong understanding.

The latter does not stand, if He came to witness to Truth.

2. Does the age of the earth – or its shape – matter to a Christian?

For a Christian, the earth could be 10,000, 10,000,000 or 10,000,000,000 years old and it does not matter which, as the Bible is not clear on the matter. But to go against the proven results of science is simply folly. For 250 years, geologists have only found evidence for an ancient earth and none for a young earth.

Three things to note.

• Even 10 000 years old is iffy, how one avoids at once pre-Adamites (human beings dying before Adam's sin), large gaps in genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 (when we find gaps in other genealogies, they are shorter than the genealogy as given, not longer) and non-historicity of Genesis 3 - so, yes, it does matter, even apart from the Christological point already made;
• The Bible is clear on the matter that the earth is NOT 100 000 years old, and so were the Church Fathers - Khemetism and Zuism or Caldanism actually have longer religious chronologies, that were directly opposed as fabulous by Church Fathers noting them;
• It is far from foolish to oppose what's wrongly presented as the "proven results of science" and the geologists finding evidence only for an ancient and none for a young earth are a selection that doesn't include Tas Walker.

3. Does the Bible teach that the earth is spherical?

Young earth creationists will often argue there is science in the Bible because the biblical writers were inspired to teach that, contrary to the wisdom of their time, the earth was spherical.

Some claim Isaiah 40:22 points to the earth being spherical. But the translations rightly say a “circle” not a sphere. Neither is it possible to read a spherical earth into Genesis 1:6-8. This is because the Bible is not interested in science. Galileo said “The Bible tells us how to go to heaven and not how the heavens go.”

Here there are even five things to answer:

• to the first audience, the Bible was neutral, precisely as the first audience of the NT didn't know its praise of Thessalonica and Beroea added up to a Bible with 72 or 73 books overall and 45 or 46 books in the OT - the distance is, as we know from modern measurements, 45 miles or 73 km - likewise, the first audience did not know that the four corners go better with maps on a globe than with the best known flat earth map, but we know it now
• Isaiah 40:22 uses, in the LXX, a word meaning circuit or circumference - compatible with a round earth as well as with a flat earth - however, it is less easy to combine circuit and four corners on a flat earth than on a globe, where the continents have four main corners as they approach the sea
• St. Augustine had no problem combining Genesis 1:6 - 8 with a round earth - it is very different to see what the text says from cross checking one term in the text with other cultures and concluding - perhaps too soon - that the other cultures in the Ancient Near East had a flat earth view, and than to conclude from that that the term chosen implies a Flat Earth view in Genesis 1 - too
• there is therefore neither in Isaiah 40:22, nor in Genesis 1, nor in Apocalypse 7:1 any scientific clear counterfactual statement that proves "the Bible is not interested in science"
• Galileo is a very bad rolemodel for Christian thinking. He's a heliocentric too.

4. How could people in 1000 BC grasp the idea of geological time?

Geologists gradually began to see that the earth was older than Ussher’s age of 4004BC after 1680. Looking at the rocks in Nant Peris in Snowdonia the Rev John Ray, a great botanist, began to wonder if the earth was older than Ussher had suggested. He was tentative and rather sceptical, but was asking the right questions. By 1800, most thought the age of the earth was in millions and that included most Christians.

In the 20th Century, radiometric age dating showed the earth is 4.6 billion years old. That is based on the physics of radioactivity and has nothing to do with evolution. If the dates are wrong then so is all physics.

Four things. And a fifth. Here:

the radiometric date being wrong doesn't invalidate "all physics" but just two guesses - that the lead content in meteorites was originally uranium content, and that the meteorites arrived when earth was formed with no previous decay;

Biblical chronology was not invented by Ussher, and so 4004 BC isn't the only Biblical epoch of creation;

by 1800 the "most" that thought the earth was millions of years, and including "most Christians" are limited to Englishmen of a certain type of education - a Catholic in Germany or Italy would have disagreed;

grasping how one arrives at "geologic time" is not necessary to grasp the simply mathematical concept of millions of years. Year was expressable. Million could be expressed as "a thousand thousands" and 100 000 000 as "ten thousand ten thousands" as these numbers occur in the Bible.

And why pose the redaction of Genesis into 1000 BC? Moses arguably wrote it around the Exodus event, 1510 BC.

5. Does the Bible always speak in a direct literal way?

The biblical writers use language in many different ways. There’s narrative, poetry, simile, metaphor and more. At times narrative, even when historical, may contain poetry. Thus Genesis 1 appears to be narrative at first sight but then each day is written in a poetic-like form; “Then God said, ‘Let there be…” followed by “And God saw that …. Was good” with a refrain “And there was evening and morning…” Just because poetry is used does not mean it is “untrue”. Psalm 23 is pure poetry using great imagery to bring out the love of God.

A historic narrative can contain inserted pieces of poetry. Adam makes a poem about Eve, Lamech makes a poem about revenge. Deborah and Barak sing poetry about Jael killing Sisera (part of the reason why Luke 1:28 and Luke 1:42 are proof texts for the Immaculate conception - "blessed among women" is a military award for killing (or crushing the head of) an important enemy of Israel). But such pieces of poetry are usually identifiable.

Seth also lived a hundred and five years, and begot Enos.

This does NOT seem to be (105 or 205 years, depending on text version, Enos or Enosh also) poetry. It's Genesis 5:6.

The genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 put, depending on text versions, Abraham going to Egypt or Abraham born 1599 to 3434 (may be slightly incorrect) years after Adam was made. If anyone says "the genealogy in Matthew 1 is incomplete," it leaves out about 5 % - not 95 %. If we might extend it to just below 4000, we can't extend it to 5000 years, let alone 40 000 years.

If we limit ourselves to figurative or other not immediately intuitive usages within Genesis 1, combining millions of years before the first man with men only existing for c. 5000 - 6000 years prior to Christ is theologically a not too bad option, accepted as not heretical by the Catholic Church, defended, along Young Earth Creationism from 1830's to 1890's both in Gap Theory version and Day Age theory version. B U T, it is, at least since carbon dating, incompatible with the scientific evidence.

And apart from clear Sapiens type skeleta dated beyond 20 000 BP, we now have clear evidence Neanderthals too were men, like clear traces of human behaviour, things needing planning that only a rational mind created in God's image (and sometimes deviating from God's likeness) could do, plus the genetic fact that we have partly Neanderthal ancestry. This means all Neanderthals, none of whom have actual body parts dated to more recently than 40 000 BP, descend from Adam. If the atmosphere they breathed was still relatively young (1655 to 2262 years old, perhaps just 1306 years old when the Flood struck), this could be because the carbon 14 level had not yet reached anywhere near 100 pmC in the atmosphere.

The Flood would certainly leave lost of the things used to date "millions of years" and we can't put Noah on a time machine to BC times.

6. Why do you assume that animal death only began to happen after Adam ate the fruit?

The theory goes that because no animals died before the fall, therefore the earth must be young. But Genesis 3 actually says nothing about animals and whether they only died after the fall. This has been read into Genesis. It comes from John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost and should not be part of Christian belief.

While I favour the view that animals with "the breath of life" didn't die before Adam sinned, as a patristically warranted but not compulsory reading of Romans 5, defended by early Church Fathers, but not all Church Fathers, we can definitely conclude that Adam didn't have parents that died before he sinned - or parents at all. If he had parents that could speak, they were created in God's image, and Adam isn't the first man. If they couldn't speak, this would have made Adam a feral child, which is a terrible condition, and which God could not have imposed on His image and likeness before He sinned.

7. Is young earth creationism the traditional Christian view?

The early Christians, right up to 1800, were not clear on the age of the earth as that depended on how literal they thought Genesis was and they had no geological evidence to guide them. Later, as geology began to show an old earth, most Christians accepted that as it did not affect Christian teaching. From 1850 onwards few Christians were young earth and it only came back in for some in the 1960s, with the coming of young earth creationism in Morris and Whitcomb’s The Genesis Flood.

Wrong. I have already mentioned that Catholics from 1830's to 1890's were divided into YEC, Gap Theory, Day-Age Theory, but the early Christians were only YEC. They may have taken different approaches to the literality of six days, but none took a non-literal approach to Genesis 5 and 11. The only lack of clarity was about what text version to best use, and some exegetical choices too.

8. Were early geologists opposed to Christianity and did they use their geology to undermine belief?

I once did a field trip with an atheist geologist and as we chatted he said that belief in an ancient earth leads to atheism. We argued and got nowhere! Yet when you read a history of geology you soon find many geologists were Christians, from Steno in 1680 up until today.

Steno was a Young Earth Creationist and a Flood Geologist.

Geology used to undermine Biblical chronology comes from clear un-Christians like James Hutton or semi-pseudo-Christians (liberal theologians) like Charles Lyell.

9. Did Christians oppose old earth geology in the past?

From my superficial reading of science books and on religion and science I thought Christians opposed geology. But I changed my mind as I did a historical study. Over several decades I have researched this question and read old theology books, journals, books by the hundred. I had to change my mind. I found that in the 17th Century Christians believed in a youngish earth as there was little geology to guide them. As geology was studied more in the 18th century more and more educated Christians realised the earth was ancient. Most Christians, often after study, concluded the earth was ancient. Very few Christians opposed geology for the last few centuries.

How much does your reading include French, German, Italian Catholic priests? Not very much, it seems. In the 1860's Paris and Louvain are still holding out against Old Earth Geology. In the 1890's, this region is indeed "Old Earth" territary, but Germany, Italy and Austria aren't.

Ottaviani at the wake of Vatican II (whether you accept the council as legitimate or not) was preparing a text to dogmatise God created heaven and earth and everything in them literally as

10. Why do you claim that so many geologists in the last 350 years got their geology wrong?

I don’t know how many geologists have studied rocks and the strata in the last 350 years. Today there are 12,000 fellows of the Geological society of London and so there must be over 100,000 qualified geologists in the world. And all except for 20-30 “young earth” geologists accept the vast age of the earth.

Undoubtedly geologists make mistakes today and did so in the past. I can give a dozen examples from Charles Darwin alone. But his and other geologists’ mistakes are minor. So far no young earther has given an argument against geological time which has any validity.

Simple math. 2018 - 350 = 1668. EVERY Geologist back then we Young Earth Creationist. AND Flood Geologist. Hutton produced his work 1788, 120 years later, and didn't get an immediate yes from all geologists.

Christians - even conservative Catholics - abandoned Flood geology for the whole Earth in response to two arguments:

• the Linnean species known from different localities all around the Earth are too many for the Ark;
• one cannot argue that the waters were adequate to cover all mountains by saying those higher than the waters of the Oceans and the ice would cover rose after the Flood, because the Pyrenees are geologically so much older than for instance the Alps.

Whatever the theological incompleteness of CMI or AiG, they are definitely adequate to answer that, and their answer can be resumed as:

• the kinds are not Linnean species, all present hedgehogs (a subfamily) have evolved from the hedgehog couple on the Ark;
• one can argue that the waters were adequate to cover all mountains by saying those higher than the waters of the Oceans and the ice would cover rose after the Flood, because the Pyrenees don't look less pointed because they are older and more worn than the Alps, but because they rose after the Flood by another process.

There is another aspect to this question.

Steno, Hutton and Lyell, Young Earth and Old Earth alike, were all of them what one may term "hobby scientists" or at least people dedicating a life work or parts of a life work (Steno died as bishop in partibus infidelium, Denmark or North Germany, among Lutherans) to something that there was no available professional formation for.

Once science becomes effectively professionalised or "expertisised" (well after Lyell, who was by training a lawyer and a botanist) most geologists have been old earth. Most, not all. Why? Because those who professionalised geology were themselves studying it in a non-professional way, in a pioneering way, among the Old Earth school, and those who weren't were marginalised by the end of the 19th C. which was by any previous standards a highly Antichristian era.

The "problem" Michael Roberts proposes is presented like parallel to "why do all Mathematicians since Pythagoras say the square of the hypothenuse is the sum of the squares of the sides adjacent to the right angle?" when it's more like a question of successive paradigm, a k a intellectual fashion, like the last centuries have seen professional astronomy monopolised (basically) by heliocentrics, while a much longer time was seeing them defending geocentrism (including, famously, Father Riccioli's Almagestum Novum).

Please Note:

• I had already written a reply to the ten questions and forgotten about it: Ten Answers (a bit more than 4 years ago, seen 298 times separately, plus the times it was seen when on the front page of the blog)
• I have made very sure than Michael Roberts knows of my answers, in advance. As per 2.V.2023, 6 pm, no answer arrived to the mail I sent from.

I Hope Karlo Broussard and Tim Staples Believe Genesis 3 is Strictly Speaking History

If they don't, this doesn't make sense, on their part:

Why Does Jesus Always Call Mary "Woman"?
Catholic Answers, 3 April 2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqg68jsoeEg

It still makes sense* objectively, since Genesis 3 is history. But it would not make sense on their part.

If they do, it makes sense on their part, as it does objectively.

But if so, they have to clarify why they are accepting as Pope a man who seems to be pretty certainly believing Genesis 1 - 11 is some other genre than history proper, and are even in Communion with people who prefer to take that stance when they are debating the Creation versus Evolution issue./HGL

* They don't stick to the "ipsa conteret" - but St. Gabriel and St. Elizabeth Cohen do. "Blessed among women" is, as Patrick Madrid pointed out, a military award to women having crushed or severed the head of a very important enemy of Israel, namely previously given by prophets, i e by the Holy Ghost, to Jael and to Judith.