Anti-Creationists and Reasoning from Errors
Many questions about creation, the Genesis Flood, the Ark, and other topics are to be expected. They happened a long time ago, and the Bible doesn't give us as much detail as some of us may think we need. There are times that questions come to mind, often during a lecture or in a conversation.
It's mighty helpful to learn about logical fallacies, especially when opponents of biblical creation use them so frequently. We get a heap of them at The Question Evolution Project, and bad reasoning from the Evo Sith is common fare on many creationary sites and social media. They get really agitated when we point out the fallacies, and some get furious when they are not allowed to continue building arguments on foundations based on faulty arguments or premises. (It's possible on rare occasions to have a valid conclusion from a bad argument, but that's not a product of skillful reasoning.) Some go riding down a trail to prove something, and this is the fallacy of the irrelevant conclusion, a close cousin of the red herring.
A frequent target of anti-creationists is Noah's Ark, which is probably because the truth of it devastates long-age geology, and Darwin needs huge amounts of time to work his magic. Noah's Ark is also a symbol of judgement, and a type of Christ, who affirmed creation, Noah, and the coming final Judgement.
If you study on it, it seems atheists and other anti-creationists could make more interesting complaints if they actually read the text before making uninformed objections. They could also simply do their homework and read up on subjects at biblical creationists' sites. It's interesting that some make a pretense of asking about our views on subjects, then object when we present them, and tell us we're wrong. Proverbs 18:2 NIV comes to mind. Don't get me wrong, I can't figure someone having a question in a conversation and saying, "I want to ask you something, but I have to research it first". That doesn't happen, and I doubt that anyone has such high expectations of questioners. Again, this is about people building arguments on uninformed opinions, building on those with multiple fallacies, and thinking they've cornered the creationists at hand.
It's mighty helpful to learn about logical fallacies, especially when opponents of biblical creation use them so frequently. We get a heap of them at The Question Evolution Project, and bad reasoning from the Evo Sith is common fare on many creationary sites and social media. They get really agitated when we point out the fallacies, and some get furious when they are not allowed to continue building arguments on foundations based on faulty arguments or premises. (It's possible on rare occasions to have a valid conclusion from a bad argument, but that's not a product of skillful reasoning.) Some go riding down a trail to prove something, and this is the fallacy of the irrelevant conclusion, a close cousin of the red herring.
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| Image credit: Pixabay / falco |
If you study on it, it seems atheists and other anti-creationists could make more interesting complaints if they actually read the text before making uninformed objections. They could also simply do their homework and read up on subjects at biblical creationists' sites. It's interesting that some make a pretense of asking about our views on subjects, then object when we present them, and tell us we're wrong. Proverbs 18:2 NIV comes to mind. Don't get me wrong, I can't figure someone having a question in a conversation and saying, "I want to ask you something, but I have to research it first". That doesn't happen, and I doubt that anyone has such high expectations of questioners. Again, this is about people building arguments on uninformed opinions, building on those with multiple fallacies, and thinking they've cornered the creationists at hand.
There are many basic misconceptions about the animals Noah took on the Ark. The ideas that there were fish on the Ark and that dinosaurs would have been too big for the Ark are two of the most persistent misconceptions. In today’s feedback Dr Jonathan Sarfati sets these and other misconceptions straight.Nope, I'm not telling you what Don wrote or Dr. Sarfati's reply. You'll have to find out by clicking on "Noah did not take fish on the Ark!"
Don P. from the United States writes: