Religion vs. Lifestyle

[blah the Prussian]

Well, this is a complicated one. I used to be an extremely jingoistically atheistic, except now I don't particularly care. I suppose I'm still an atheist, but I don't give a damn if everyone is an atheist or no one is. That may be surprising to some, as I am a monarchist and have made that rather clear, but I don't believe in any of that divine right crap. I also have the moral compass that essentially says that it is natural for the strong to enforce their will on the weak, and we as humans have proven our superiority by evolving beyond nature. I firmly reject naturalism as nature is a cruel, ruthless place where there is no compassion or remorse. I believe that it would be to the benefit of both animals and humans if we domesticated as many animals as we can. I know my dog is happier than wolves, for example.

[Espinosa]

'Spirituality' as a word generally has negative connotations for me. Much like intelligence, talking about having it makes it transparent that you don't have any semblance of said quality. For that reason, I've found people going out of their way to prove that they're supposedly spiritual (as if to disprove some perceived stereotype) to look quite silly. Talking about spirituality in such a manner is also dangerous because, unlike intelligence, it is not accumulated on one's own through some manner of systematic work; you can be robbed of all of it at your earliest inconvenience.

I'd rather find indication of people's spirituality in their silence and stoic overcoming of the obstacles life throws their way, which demands this kind of capacity to persevere against all odds without murmur.

Then there's the obvious fact the term has been discredited and devalued like virtually no other. Members of all sorts of cults and financial exploits that are so rampant nowadays, drug addicts, readers of cheesy literature and emotional, megalomaniac young people (or a more unfortunate case in point, adults whose ageing will not correlate with accrual of any wisdom), just people who are driven deeply into all sorts of delusion due to unfortunate circumstances and backgrounds all exhibit one distinct tendency - one to be so oblivious to the basic events in their own lives that they will neglect everybody and everything while pursuing a perceived spiritual aim, usually achieving nothing and hurting everyone including themselves. You will hardly be mistaken if you assume that people whose spirituality is their go-to topic for conversation are unlucky and crippled people; it's also not uncommon for them to realise this quite fully as they know that there's a price to be paid for certain choices.

At the same time, it is also true, nevertheless, that religion/spirituality and ethics don't always go hand in hand, and you will always have people who adhere to 'reductive materialism', as it was put earlier in this thread, and whose demeanour is nothing short of excellent, and also people who appear to be a living wreck and yet happen to have rare spiritual gifts that no observer would assume. The gifts of spirituality can be concealed, and concealing them can be seen as a way to preserve them, and this is where the imperative to not judge the fellow man applies. You simply do not know anyone well enough based on just what you observe.

And just to comment on the connection between appreciation of fine things, arts and ideas and religion/spirituality, I would say the opposite is true. Religion mobilises a person, shows a certain direction for their lives, restricts with taboos and guidelines for different occasions, putting one's spirit at rest, while the world of art is a world of endless searching, restless and unstable. The claim that there is any contradiction between religion and science is an odd one, as the two have a parent and child relationship so to speak, one hailing from another, but it's likely that there's no sharper opposite to religion than art. Magic is religion's main antonym of course, but one can gather this much from their very notions anyway. Combining art and religiosity would be the toughest challenge one could face on their way.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Espinosa

[Crysta]

The only god I worship is the sun because I can see it and it keeps me alive.

On another barely related note, I do wonder what would happen if I tell my kid Santa doesn't exist, where babies came from, and Christopher Columbus was actually an asshole. How would others react to him? Fairy tales have more power than I wish they did.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Crysta

[Chiki]

Snowy never said that a world of scientific pursuits and a world of aesthetic pursuits were mutually exclusive.

Yes he did. There's no need to bring in crap about "reductive materialism." It has nothing to do with the debate.

"If we wanted to distill the world down to its most bare and logical conclusions we'd have

If everyone followed this, this would be a world of scientific pursuits.

we'd have, well, little more than a boring, uninteresting, world where everything would be basically run by a computer deciding the most 'logical' course of action

Then this would be a world without aesthetic pursuits.

That doesn't mean science and creationism are mutually exclusive

Yes it does. They are completely mutually exclusive. If evolution is true, creationism must be false. If creationism is true, evolution must be false. Creationists think God snapped his fingers and created humans. That's not what happened.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Chiki

[Rehab]

Hrm. Somehow I'm beginning to doubt many observing the thread, going forward, will be comfortable sharing how religion has affected their lives/lifestyles, from the direction it's going. I hope that isn't so.

Not that I don't appreciate for anything sf's periodic back-and-forths on the subject, (as, if I'm painfully forthright, I'd probably be a different person if I hadn't observed them as a teenager,) but I'd very much appreciate a chance to just hear people speak to their own experiences with religion, and to the ways it now affects their lives day to day.

Or the same with non-religion. Or atheism. Or whatever. No presumption intended.

The only god I worship is the sun because I can see it and it keeps me alive.

On another barely related note, I do wonder what would happen if I tell my kid Santa doesn't exist, where babies came from, and Christopher Columbus was actually an asshole. How would others react to him? Fairy tales have more power than I wish they did.

IMO the more and the earlier people learn that Columbus was an asshole, the better Edited June 10, 2015 by Rehab

[MacLovin]

I believe in religion as a system of beliefs, more or less.

Both of my parents are Catholics, but I was taught to look past the organized structure of the church and all the "literal" interpretations of various religious texts.

Just follow the basic rules that alot of religions have of "be respectful to one's parents, never lie/cheat/steal, etc.

[blah the Prussian]

IMO the more and the earlier people learn that Columbus was an asshole, the better

This is the truest thing that has been said in this thread so far.

[Phoenix Wright]

i'm agnostic. i don't like the connotations that atheist takes with it, so agnosticism is the only label i'll choose.

snowy, creationism (or at least young-earth peeps, but not limited to that particular group) and what we have observed using scientific methods are wholly incompatible. this becomes evident if you learn a little about the image you posted--those galaxies are billions of years old (among the plethora of other interesting insights that image brings). normally, i wouldn't really care about the whole creationism vs science thing (i've been done with those discussions for years), but using the hudf as part of an argument for why one can (or ought to?) believe in creationism almost physically hurts me.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Phoenix Wright

[Rapier]

so snowy is claiming that the pursuit of scientific truth produces a world that cannot produce art, fantasy, or culture. this is false

Reading comprehension time #2.

He didn't say the pursuit of scientific truth produces a world without art, fantasy or culture. He said the SOLE FOCUS on what you classify as the pursuit of scientific truth produces a world without art, fantasy or culture.

Limiting knowledge to science is pretty dumb because it doesn't take into account the many branches of knowledge that makes the bigger picture. Besides, science is also limited. It will never provide answers to philosophical or metaphyisical questions alone, because these are beyond its area of expertise. Not everything can be experimented and observed.

If evolution is true, creationism must be false. If creationism is true, evolution must be false. Creationists think God snapped his fingers and created humans.

Creationists think so, yet nothing stops God from making the world and creating humans the way evolution describles as being true (taking God's existance and the genesis as axioms). And the Bible leaves the description of how the world came to be in a very vague way. It doesn't say God snapped his fingers and everything came to be at that very second.

Time descriptions in old books are also questionable because time perceptions are relative. They obviously didn't operate with the system we have today. And this is even more alarmant when we consider the Bible says there was no night or day shifts in the beginning. How can we know the 6 days that God needed to make the world were 6 days as we perceive it?

It reminds me of Kant's transcendental idealism, but I'm not completely sure of this. So what do you think? You think it wasn't possible for 6 days to mean a timespawn very different from what we think nowadays?

Edited June 10, 2015 by Rapier

[Chiki]

He didn't say the pursuit of scientific truth produces a world without art, fantasy or culture. He said the SOLE FOCUS on what you classify as the pursuit of scientific truth produces a world without art, fantasy or culture.

He said the former:

we wanted to distill the world down to its most bare and logical conclusions

Copy and paste the bit where he specifies "sole focus."

Edited June 10, 2015 by Chiki

[Blaze The Great]

He said the former:

Copy and paste the bit where he specifies "sole focus."

If you were to "distill the world down to its most bare and logical conclusions", then anything that was not considered the "most logical conclusion" would be ignored. Since ideas such as culture and art are aesthetic pursuits and not scientific ones, they would be ignored for not being logical enough.

[Snowy_One]

Alright. Now that I'm here, let me settle this.

A scientific world is NOT incapable of art. After all, something like abstract art does not require any particularly scientific or spiritual prowess to be art. HOWEVER, if you turn to a world where everything MUST be science and no spirituality or thought outside of what is scientific is allowed you DO lose art because you have turned the world into little more than a giant petrie dish in which nothing unique ever actually happens and everything is just cause and reaction. This view has become increasingly common among 'modern' 'atheists' who tend to espouse science and act like everything must be scientific. This means that the little bit in Episode 1 of Star Wars matters a lot because midichlorines manage to explain the Force without the need for anything spiritual and the like.

As for evolution and creationism; yes, creationism and evolution are mutually exclusive. Creationism believes that the world was created in six, literal, days for example. I'm sure most scientists would agree that is not what the theory of evolution states. If I had to sit down and actually defend it I would have to say evolution is, from a logical and debate standpoint, more likely to be true. However I do believe that faith requires that there be ways to explain what happened without having to rely on only one answer and many of the modern movements and representatives of people who believe in the 4.6 billion year old explanation are simply so toxic, disgusting, and insulting the bigger miracle is that I have even considered evolution and any process longer than the 6-day creation than not.

[Ema Skye]

Devout Christian here (or at least for the most part).

I believe the way I do because the more I learn about this world, the more implausible it is for me to believe it just showed up one day. The balance of this world is perfect, and yet way too delicate to be happenstance. Nothing is that lucky.

I know people have issue with the idea of faith because "the evidence of things not yet seen" (the Biblical definition) sounds like a contradictory definition (evidence requires something to be seen, but faith requires something that you haven't seen yet). But I find faith gives me a lot of peace, because it means I don't need to know an explanation for everything in the world. As said above, this world is too perfect to have explanations for everything.

[Rapier]

He said the former:

Copy and paste the bit where he specifies "sole focus."

You're nitpicking. Sole focus and distill were employed in similar enough meanings. To distill the world to the 'pursuit of scientific truth' is to give sole focus to the 'pursuit of scientific truth'. Distill means to take everything else unnecessary away.

Snowy clarified it in his newest post, by the way.

And creationism and science can coexist as much as squares and circles coexist, even though a square can never be circular, even if creationism can never be scientific (they can never mix). To coexist and to mix are completely different things. Not to even mention that the creationists' view on creationism might be completely wrong. How do these statements contradict each other?:

- A God creates the world

- The proccess of development of the species is the one describled by evolutionism

I'll cede when you prove that these statements are mutually exclusive.

Creationism believes that the world was created in six, literal, days for example

Is the concept of day in the Bible the same concept of day we have today? Did a day at that time have 24 hours? How were days even calculated before there was light? Are there differences between a day for God and a day for humans? Until these questions can be satisfactorily answered, I can not accept the literal take on the Bible.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Rapier

[Jedi]

Devout Christian here (or at least for the most part).

I believe the way I do because the more I learn about this world, the more implausible it is for me to believe it just showed up one day. The balance of this world is perfect, and yet way too delicate to be happenstance. Nothing is that lucky.

I know people have issue with the idea of faith because "the evidence of things not yet seen" (the Biblical definition) sounds like a contradictory definition (evidence requires something to be seen, but faith requires something that you haven't seen yet). But I find faith gives me a lot of peace, because it means I don't need to know an explanation for everything in the world. As said above, this world is too perfect to have explanations for everything.

Pretty much in the same boat.

I've had my faith from a young age, it was never forced on me. My family is pretty hit&miss when it comes to their faith and such.

It keeps me calm in times of strife, or else I'd really stress about everything in my life. I don't really have much to say though, I believe what I believe and others believe what they believe. It's been that way, and it will continue being that way.

[Phoenix Wright]

As for evolution and creationism; yes, creationism and evolution are mutually exclusive. Creationism believes that the world was created in six, literal, days for example. I'm sure most scientists would agree that is not what the theory of evolution states. If I had to sit down and actually defend it I would have to say evolution is, from a logical and debate standpoint, more likely to be true. However I do believe that faith requires that there be ways to explain what happened without having to rely on only one answer and many of the modern movements and representatives of people who believe in the 4.6 billion year old explanation are simply so toxic, disgusting, and insulting the bigger miracle is that I have even considered evolution and any process longer than the 6-day creation than not.

the crux of science is not that something is logical or makes sense, it's about what is and what is not demonstrable. you chose not to respond, but as i said about the hubble ultra deep field, it has been demonstrated and observed that some of those galaxies approach thirteen billion years in age.

theory is one thing, a very important thing, but what you are doing is opting for faith in lieu of what can indeed be observed. the speed of light is not theoretical, the distance from here to the moon is not theoretical, that the universe is accelerating is not theoretical. these are things that we know. if you'd like, i can point you to sources that could possibly explain how we know these things...

edit: i feel i should add that by "theoretical" i mean what we are iffy/unsure about vs what we feel we know (based on observation). planetary formation is still largely theoretical, meaning the problem is still young and we still don't know very much about it. the speed of light in a vaccuum is not "theoretical" in this sense. somewhat confusingly, neither are the theories of special or general relativity.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Phoenix Wright

[Chiki]

Sole focus and distill were employed in similar enough meanings. To distill the world to the 'pursuit of scientific truth' is to give sole focus to the 'pursuit of scientific truth'. Distill means to take everything else unnecessary away.

There's a difference between a claim and the property of that claim. "distill the world down" means something like to study the world to its limits. On the other hand, to "solely focus" on the pursuit of scientific truth is to say "to solely focus on distilling the world down to its logical limits." See, "solely focus" modifies "distilling the world down to its logical limits." This shows the distinction between the two claims, and that I'm right.

And creationism and science can coexist as much as squares and circles coexist, even though a square can never be circular, even if creationism can never be scientific (they can never mix). To coexist and to mix are completely different things.

Ok, but this is completely trivial tautology. It's like saying, "the sky is blue" or "ISIS and Christians coexist" or "Rapier is pregnant or he is not pregnant." So what? No one cares.

How do these statements contradict each other?:

- A God creates the world

- The proccess of development of the species is the one describled by evolutionism

They don't, but that's not what creationists say. Instead:

Creationists: God created humans.

Evolutionists: Humans were created in a very gradual process of natural selection.

Even these two statements aren't contradictory (God might have controlled every single movement of every particle so that humans were born eventually I guess). But this is so silly, since God is omnipotent why doesn't he just flick his fingers and make humans?

I'm not sure what the Bible says about the creation of humans exactly, and whether or not we should take it literally. I've never read the Bible. But I think how God creates is that he just literally flicks his fingers and they come into being. So let's update the conundrum:

Creationists: God created humans instantly.

Evolutionists: Humans were created gradually.

And then the contradiction arises.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Chiki

[Blaze The Great]

There's a difference between a claim and the property of that claim. "distill the world down" means something like to study the world to its limits. On the other hand, to "solely focus" on the pursuit of scientific truth is to say "to solely focus on distilling the world down to its logical limits." See, "solely focus" modifies "distilling the world down to its logical limits." This shows the distinction between the two claims, and that I'm right.

They don't, but that's not what creationists say. Instead:

Creationists: God created humans.

Evolutionists: Humans were created in a very gradual process of natural selection.

Even these two statements aren't contradictory (God might have controlled every single movement of every particle so that humans were born eventually I guess). But this is so silly, since God is omnipotent why doesn't he just flick his fingers and make humans?

I'm not sure what the Bible says about the creation of humans exactly, and whether or not we should take it literally. I've never read the Bible. But I think how God creates is that he just literally flicks his fingers and they come into being. So let's update the conundrum:

Creationists: God created humans instantly.

Evolutionists: Humans were created gradually.

And then the contradiction arises.

One of the definitions of distill is to extract the essential meaning from something. Therefore, if the world only extracted the essential meaning of something and that something was believed to be science (which, for the sake of this discussion, it is), then we would solely be focusing on it because we extracted it as the essential meaning of our world.

As for whether or not we should take the Bible literally, I think we should take the story of creation as a metaphor. In the New testament, there is a verse saying a day for humans is like a thousand years for God and a thousand years for humans like a day for God. Which basically goes to say, in the realm God theoretically exists in, time is very different from our own. So, the six days are likely a metaphor, simply used to divide up the time between which different matter and animals appeared. For all we know, six days could have actually been 4.6 billion years.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Blaze The Great

[Chiki]

Therefore, if the world only extracted the essential meaning of something and that something was believed to be science (which, for the sake of this discussion, it is), then we would solely be focusing on it because we extracted it as the essential meaning of our world.

You're doing it wrong! You put the bolded part there of your own accord. That's not what Snowy said. Snowy merely said "distill the world." Not "only distill the world."

I repeat. "Solely focus" modifies the claim "distill the world," in the same way that, when you put "only" it modified "distill the world."

As for whether or not we should take the Bible literally, I think we should take the story of creation as a metaphor. In the New testament, there is a verse saying a day for humans is like a thousand years for God and a thousand years for humans like a day for God. Which basically goes to say, in the realm God theoretically exists in, time is very different from our own. So, the six days are likely a metaphor, simply used to divide up the time between which different matter and animals appeared. For all we know, six days could have actually been 4.6 billion years.

Ok, your position is logically compatible with evolution, but at the cost of not taking the Bible literally. But then I have to ask why God would do such a roundabout way to create humans and animals and everything, since he's omnipotent, and he could literally just snap his fingers to create people.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Chiki

[Rapier]

@Chiki

Ok, it's Snowy's wording that made it confusing. Let's take a look at his new statement.

A scientific world is NOT incapable of art. After all, something like abstract art does not require any particularly scientific or spiritual prowess to be art. HOWEVER, if you turn to a world where everything MUST be science and no spirituality or thought outside of what is scientific is allowed you DO lose art

From his claim I infer that's what he means: That a world solely focused on science is incapable of art. Which was my original point. His wording is... qualitative, right?

I mean, we've been silly. We could've just asked him about it.

Also, the coexist thing is irrelevant, alright. I just said it so I could show how creationism and science could coexist but not mix.

Creationists: God created humans instantly.

Evolutionists: Humans were created gradually.

And then the contradiction arises.

I agree, it is a blatant contradiction. Yet, couldn't creationists be wrong about creationism? Actually, what makes a definition? Is it just what most people think it means?

Edited June 10, 2015 by Rapier

[Blaze The Great]

You're doing it wrong! You put the bolded part there of your own accord. That's not what Snowy said. Snowy merely said "distill the world." Not "only distill the world."

I repeat. "Solely focus" modifies the claim "distill the world," in the same way that, when you put "only" it modified "distill the world."

Ok, then take the word only out of my argument. If we extracted what we found to be the essential meaning of something, would we not wholeheartedly pursue it? Even if our pursuit was misguided, we would go after it.

Ok, your position is logically compatible with evolution, but at the cost of not taking the Bible literally. But then I have to ask why God would do such a roundabout way to create humans and animals and everything, since he's omnipotent, and he could literally just snap his fingers to create people.

We understand so little about the creation of the world, it's hard to take anything about it literally. No one in this thread or participating in any other debate on this topic was there when it was created, so we are unable to definitively know exactly what happened. As for your second point, I know it seems like a crappy answer, but God could have very easily simply preferred to allow us to evolve into human beings instead of just going "ok boom, here is this and this and this and this and whew I'm done". That's really a toss up though.

[Chiki]

If we extracted what we found to be the essential meaning of something, would we not wholeheartedly pursue it?

No. I'm trying to figure out the essential difference between adjectives on the easiness scale and adjectives which aren't (all other adjectives basically), but I also like to play Fire Emblem and stuff.

but God could have very easily simply preferred to allow us to evolve into human beings instead of just going "ok boom, here is this and this and this and this and whew I'm done".

Why though? It seems completely unnecessary knowing that God is omnipotent. Why would he wait billions and billions of years to make us?

It's just a really forced way for religious people to account for scientific facts, imo.

[Blaze The Great]

No. I'm trying to figure out the essential difference between adjectives on the easiness scale and adjectives which aren't (all other adjectives basically), but I also like to play Fire Emblem and stuff.

A logical enough argument, but can one part of one of the many languages around the world be truly comparable to finding the mechanisms, origins, and possibly even purpose of life?

Why though? It seems completely unnecessary knowing that God is omnipotent. Why would he wait billions and billions of years to make us?

It's just a really forced way for religious people to account for scientific facts, imo.

Well I would say ask God but...

In all seriousness, it's not really forced. It makes perfect sense, and it fits in with both the Bible and evolutionism. Logic still applies to the metaphysical, but that doesn't mean that a being like a human would operate the same way God would, mentally or in any other regard.

[Rehab]

In my case, the part of faith in religion has felt like a slightly more nuanced stumbling block than me just being unable to accept ever believing something difficult or even impossible to prove, or even, more generally, taking some figurative refuge in beliefs. I've done a bit of that myself at times. (Although I do often hear a voice in the back of my head asking "have I really come to a solid enough conclusion?" when I haven't given it the harshest possible leak-seeking rational inquiry, and find my preferences/biases aren't taking offense.)

Inherent human goodness, or at least a common desire for it, for example; if you asked me, I'd say I've found more to corroborate my opinion on it (that it exists, in at least some form) than to disprove it, but while I have healthy doubts here and there, it'd be misleading to say I've held the idea up to the highest possible scrutiny, like the same needlepoint-focused side-eyeing that I'd immediately give to, say, an assertion that homosexuality destroyed the Roman Empire. (Again, I'm confident enough I could construct a, let's say a solid argument for both issues, but I could say I "take refuge in my beliefs" more in one case than in the other. And I probably wouldn't "enjoy" arguing both issues equally. And, just to be sure the point of this paragraph hasn't been lost, I can let what might be called "faith" affect my thoughts on the subject despite being at most areligious.)

More difficult for me to accept has been an idea I seem to run up against as often as almost any other common thread I've found in religious thought- that I will not only be less than fully correct, but also somehow deficient, as in verifiably worse as a person, until I accept every part of a religion to be true, including (Especially Including, even) the parts that work on logic that's unnecessary or even impossible for me to understand.

To be sure, many or even most religions have within them schools of thought that consider it unnecessary to accept only one right answer for absolutely every issue the religion speaks on, and to do so with complete conviction or not at all. (And, of course, I haven't found a single religion without different denominations whose views differ on every sort of thing in the religion one can think of.) Something about those bits where "capital f Faith is capital n Necessary, or (capital f) Fuck Off," seems to keep me at a distance from them all, though.

Also, I guess my problems with the kind of faith religion requires aren't helped by there being so dang many out there, all of them (or at least a lot) demanding absolute, exclusive (usually/often) obeisance, and for it to be of... well, -religious- conviction. (This might actually be more of a thing in "Western" religious thought, but anyway.) For somebody who wasn't much raised in any particular tradition of spirituality and so on, deciding to subscribe to one ancient, exclusive, value- and ritual-proscribing cosmology, when there's another one that formed as far away and under conditions as different as possible, which also asks for and does all or a whole lot of the same things... it feels, kinda. "Silly" isn't quite the right word, because I know it has been done and don't feel like spitting on those who have, but, uh, let's say it would be, "difficult," for me to do that and keep all the conflicts in the back of my head. At best.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Rehab

[dondon151]

until we do distill the natural world down into total comprehension of atoms and forces (which will never happen), then scientism isn't a problem, lol. we will never reach the imagined dystopia where aesthetics are meaningless.

additionally, it's possible to make an effort to understand aesthetics from a scientific point of view (i.e., how aesthetics is related to neurology), and even if we had full understanding through this perspective, it wouldn't invalidate the pursuit of aesthetics.

In all seriousness, it's not really forced. It makes perfect sense, and it fits in with both the Bible and evolutionism. Logic still applies to the metaphysical, but that doesn't mean that a being like a human would operate the same way God would, mentally or in any other regard.

it's forced because you've cherry-picked the one detail in the abrahamic creation myth that might be interpreted to mean evolution in the sense of a convoluted metaphor while ignoring all of the other parts of the creation myth that contradict our understanding of the universe and physics.

day 1: and god saw the light, that [it was] good: and god divided the light from the darkness. and god called the light day, and the darkness he called night.

day 4: let there be the sun at day and the moon and stars at night.

???

god created light, day, and night 3 god-days before he created the sun, moon, and stars, which are the sources of light that define day and night.

day 3: let the dry [land] appear: and it was so. and god called the dry [land] earth.

day 4: let there be the sun at day and the moon and stars at night.

???

we know from geology, astronomy, and cosmology that the earth was created at the same time as the moon, it was created after the sun, and it was created looong after most of the stars we see at night. so even if we were to take this story metaphorically where one god-day can mean any arbitrary length of positive time, the order is wrong.

day 3: let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, [and] the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind.

day 6: let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind.

???

fruit-bearing plants (angiosperms, or flowering plants) evolved in coexistence with land animals - that's why they bear fruit. but according to genesis, god created land animals 3 god-days after he created flowering plants.

day 5: let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl [that] may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

day 6: let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind.

???

birds did not exist until long after the first animals walked on land. primitive birds co-existed with dinosaurs.

okay, so even if i were to give you that the timeline of the genesis creation myth is totally malleable any way that you want to see fit as long as you preserve the order, there are four big instances in which god still gets the order wrong. the only reason why he doesn't get more wrong is because the writers of the bible were too ignorant of the natural world to make more incorrect claims.

so at this point, we can either continue to contort the biblical creation myth so that it corroborates what we know about the universe through scientific inquiry, or we can stop for a moment and consider that maybe it is simply irreconcilable to any comprehensible degree. but since you said:

Logic still applies to the metaphysical, but that doesn't mean that a being like a human would operate the same way God would, mentally or in any other regard.

i'm waiting for you to say that god doesn't have to follow the progression of time, either.

Edited June 10, 2015 by dondon151