The Bible and Science?

Question

According to the Bible, in the beginning, God created the world in 7 days and put animals and humans (Adam and Eve) to live in peace with one another.

According to science. The world evolved and started with living organisms which turned into the beginning of the Dinosaurs which then evolved into other animals such as sabre tooths and mammoths, etc. Dinosaurs lived on earth for many hundreds and thousands (maybe more) years and the same with all other animals that have and some still do exist here today. We humans had evolved from primate species into what we are today.

My questions are

1) how come science doesn't match up to the bible?

2) If we was created by God, according to the bible, then how come it took humans many years to evolve from "monkeys" into humans, according to science?

3) What proof is there that the world was created by God according to the bible, it just doesn't match with science which has proof that dinosaurs existed?

4) What is one supposed to believe in?

Answer 1

It's all what you believe, i believe Science Really....

because there is evidence

Answer 2

The Bible is a series of books, the Old Testament is basically the Jewish part. It was therefore mostly an oral history with the slant being towards poorly educated and rather backward peasant type population. So it had to be a story, not a documentary. And it wasnt written by God ( I know His handwriting) it was written by priests, so its biased. Against all that it does tell, 9although its been changed so often its hard to find) quite a lot of historically chaseable stuff, like the flood obviously.

Also the world was a small area, centred on Jerusalem

( remember who wrote it and where they lived) so its not going to mention coloured people very nicely since there would have been conflicts with them over territory, also its been translated by the white guys a lot, so the fact that Moses would have been a bit brown is casually left out.

But lets not get hung up about no mention of Dinosaurs. There isnt much mention of any stuff really predating man, I mean who would have recorded it?

The New Testament has much more accurate and historically traceable stuff in. And was also written by the winners lets not forget.

Bottom line, will it hurt you to follow the principles in the book?

and mostly, unless you are seriously rich or screwed up the answer is no.

So lets get back to the real issues, like why do Muslims, Jews and Mormons et al not realise that Heaven is a multifaith environement. Every one can enter, if you have faith, no need to pay for registering, no need to save a daughter or two for the Jihad boys, and foreskins are allowed

Answer 3

a1) Science describes the natural world by using common sense and the scientific method. The Bible is a religious book that narrates a religious story. The Bible doesn't have the ambition to be geology textbook.

For example, in the Bible, at the beginning, the snake talks to Eve. Nobody says: it doesn't make sense, snakes don't speak; everybody understands that snake represents something/somebody else.

The style, symbols and images used in the Bible are not the same as a textbook on astrophysics or biology.



a2)  I don't quite get it.

a3)  The proof  that the world was created by God according to the Bible, is not a proof as such: it is a question of faith.

a4)  belief + personal spiritual experiences = religion

common sense, scientific method + reasoning = science.

Answer 4

Hi.

First of all, science doesnt want to believe in anything that it cannot see, touch, feel or prove outright.  Thus, a lack of faith.

Second, if you look around you, how can you NOT believe there is a higher power or a God?  Look at nature, how things work.  The trees and plants create oxygen so we can breathe.  Even scientists are at a loss to explain how the human body, (the most complex creation ever) came to be from a single cell ameoba.  Of course it didnt.

Perhaps some people think we all "Evolved" from monkeys or some other lower life creature, but if that is so, then why dont we see evolution continuing?  The answer is that evolution is only a THEORY and nothing more, just as is the Big Bang a THEORY and all the rest.

As for God and creation, we have the bible.  Scientists the world over have concluded that the original dead sea scrolls are from the time of Christ, and it is a definitive record of what He did here on earth. (oh by the way, there is more proof that Christ lived and did the things he and others said he did than there is about any other subject).  The Bible is a clear record of what God wants us to know, and how He expects us to live.

As for why we cannot "prove" it by seeing it, the answer is simple.  God wants us to have FAITH in Him.  We have to believe.  We must have faith.

Sure there is a lot of suffering and pain in this world, and we all have to experience it.  But If we cannot see the wonders God has created in this world and know there is a higher power watching over us, then we are certainly lost and live itself will have no meaning.  These things did not just happen.  

So if you want to investigate the "missing link" then you will waste your life in doing so, because there is no missing link.  The only link we need to make is the link between us, mankind, and God.  

If you wish to know more I recommend seeking a good Christian pastor (there are men and women pastors now) who can show you the way to salvation.  

God Bless you always.

Answer 5

The Bible was never intended to be a science book.  In general, it was written to be understood by the people to whom it was written.  I think some of early Genesis was written in an allegorical literary style, and was not intended to be taken as a detailed historical account.  With this view, I find nothing in the Bible which conflicts with science.  Any evolutionary theory could be true, even the most extreme, even abiogenesis, and still not conflict with the Bible, properly understood.  The Bible offers an 'explanation' for what science is nowhere near explaining:  where did it all come from in the first place?   The message of Genesis 1 is that God created it.  We're a long long way from the ability to prove or disprove that.

The uniqueness of man is not the body (nearly identical to apes), or even intelligence.  It's the spirit.  But that's independent of science.

One is supposed to use one's own intellect to evaluate the evidence and draw their own conclusion, rather than to accept indoctrination from any position.  As long as you're asking the questions, you have the potential to learn.

Answer 6

That's the point of "faith", I suppose. Having faith that all we know is delusion and that the testaments are the ultimate truth.

Trouble is - the testaments were written in a very primative age and their explanations of the world are based on legend and myth that stretches back tens of thousands of years...

Science is the result of careful observation, experimentation and proof... I know which one I believe in.

I am absolutely certain there is no god.

(Let's see how many thumbs down I collect from the loonies...)

EDIT:

Daniel B - your statements are fundamentally wrong: we do have a VERY GOOD idea how humans and everything else evolved from basic organisms. Also evolution IS going on all around us all the time - it takes an Awfully Long Time, you know. We aren't going to grow wings any time soon (or ever, for that matter).

This is the common problem with 'believers' - they talk from a position of hear-say (which is also the basis of their faith), not from informed research.

Answer 7

"science doesnt want to believe in anything that it cannot see, touch, feel"

If you can't see, touch, feel, taste, or smell it, then how does it exist in any meaningful way?  The answer - it doesn't

"Even scientists are at a loss to explain how the human body, (the most complex creation ever) came to be from a single cell ameoba."

Wrong

"Perhaps some people think we all "Evolved" from monkeys or some other lower life creature, but if that is so, then why dont we see evolution continuing?"

We DO see evolution continuing.  Recently A biologist named Richard Lenski documented the evolution of a novel, beneficial new trait among his bacterial research subjects, which qualifies them as an entirely new species never before seen on earth that came about through evolution.  Maybe you haven't heard of all of the new drug-resistant bacteria and super-virii but these are the result of the bacteria and virii evolving in the prescence of our conventional treatments.

It's easier to observe in microorganisms because of their short generational lifespan, but we have actually observed examples in large organisms too.  Not long ago, a population of lizards on an island evolved a completely new jaw and gut structure in approximately 30 years.  For you to say that we don't see evolution occurring now shows that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

"The answer is that evolution is only a THEORY and nothing more, just as is the Big Bang a THEORY and all the rest."

Anybody who uses the 'evolution is only a theory' argument is ignorant.  Plain and simple, there's no other way around it.  You're ignorant to what the word theory means in a scientific context.  It's an explanation of WHY things happen, not if they happen or not.  We KNOW evolution happens.  The theory of evolution is about WHY it happens.

Did you know that gravity is 'only a theory'?  It's true.  And yet, if you let go of a rock in mid air, it will still fall.  That's because gravity happens, this is a fact.  The theory of gravity is an attempt to explain why.

Same thing with evolution.  The fact that evolution occurs is indeed a known, observed, undeniable fact.  The theory of evolution is only an explanation of WHY evolution occurs.

"there is more proof that Christ lived and did the things he and others said he did than there is about any other subject"

Bull.S**t.  Jesus was barely mentioned outside of christian sources, and most, if not all of those external references were influenced by the christian writings.  There is ZERO evidence that he even existed at all outside of christian sources.  There is actually a scholarly debate over whether he was even a real person or not.

Watch a little movie called 'The God Who Wasn't There.'  They go over the fact that there is a gap of a minimum of 40 years after Jesus' supposed death before anyone actually wrote about him.

There is evidence that Peter (the founder of the christian church) was not even highly regarded by Jesus in the apocryphal books, and that Thomas was the one who was actually intended to start the church before Peter decided to jump in and take over, against Jesus' wishes.  This is of course assuming that these people even existed.

The story of early christianity is so cloudy and mixed up it's hard to even know where to start.

"As for why we cannot "prove" it by seeing it, the answer is simple. God wants us to have FAITH in Him. We have to believe. We must have faith"

The definition of faith is believing in something without any good reason to believe in it.  

I have no idea why religious types actually think faith is a good thing.  

Nor why they aren't suspicious of a god who they claim created the world in 6000 years, then manipulated all the evidence to make it appear the world was billions of years old.  Does that not imply that your god is underhanded and basically lying to everyone to try to send us to h**l?  It's one thing for him to not leave evidence of himself, but to manipulate evidence to try and suggest he doesn't exist?

Okay, anyways, for questions 1 and 2.  In spite of everything I just wrote, the bible and science are actually slightly compatible.  The trick is that you have to believe the bible was written as a story with a moral, not a literal description of the world.

Question 3: There is no proof.  The bible is the only evidence, but the bible only works if you believe god wrote it.  And the only reason to believe god wrote it is in the bible.  It's just circular reasoning.  There's just no real evidence.

Question 4:  Don't believe in science.  Science does not require you to 'believe' in it.  It is a collection of facts and logical explanations, if you understand it then there is no belief required.  Nobody in science is asking you to take their word on anything, we always describe how we found out what we know, so you can do it yourself if you want to.

The only question is if you want to believe in the bible or not.  Don't forget that, in addition to the christian bible, there are thousands of other bibles that are completely different.  And none of them give any good reason why you should believe theirs and not the others.

Answer 8

The only real answer is that if there is a God he is very stupid.

Answer 9

1.  In a way it does.  The bible gave us a creation story written in a time before science.  At first glance what science tells us seems to contradict that word.  But rather than contradict, it informs us of how God worked this miracle.  Perhaps the order and timing of things is different, but nothing science tells us about the origins of our universe, our planet, life or humans disproves God.

2.  The bible tells us God created all creatures and plants.  Evolution tells us how.  It is a near certainty that humans  emerged little by little from earlier hominids (as did the modern apes.)  That does not mean there was no Adam or Eve.  Our species emerged and thrived in very little time on the grand evolutionary scale and we of course are like no other.  There is room to believe that we were made by God, but the method was most certainly evolution.

3.  Scientific proof?  None of course.  But what scientific proof establishes there is no God?  None of course.  Again, science informs us of details of the natural world.  The bible informs us on matters of faith. They need not tell us the same thing in the same way.

4.  One is supposed to believe in what gives us comfort and soothes our soul.  For many that is a higher power, for others that is only the empirical with no magic.  But no matter what anyone on either side of this apparent dichotomy says about the absolute truth, no one has all of the answers.

Answer 10

1) because it cant

2) it wasnt

3) there isnt

4) whatever makes them feel better

Science has explanations as to how we came to be along with every plant and animal.  as for god, im sure the stories of joseph, mary, and jesus are true and highly exagerated but i believe them to be just that...stories. i would love for the people out there to study chemistry, biology, and things of that sort then tell us that god created the world.

Answer 11

A few quick corrections:

> "According to science. The world evolved and started with living organisms"

Not quite. Though the theory of evolution is well-accepted and well-understood, it does not describe how life began, only how it changes and has changed.

The scientific field investigating the possible origins of life is called "Abiogenesis", and is much less well-understood.

> "The world evolved and started with living organisms which turned into the beginning of the Dinosaurs"

This is true, but doesn't fully describe the timescale we're talking about here. Life originated about 4 BILLION years ago on earth, and the dinsaurs didn't arrive until 250 million years ago (1/16th of the time life had existed).

> "Dinosaurs lived on earth for many hundreds and thousands (maybe more) years.

Dinosaurs arose about 250 MILLION years ago, and died out about 65 MILLION years ago. So, they roamed the earth for around 185 MILLION (not thousand) years. To put this in perspective, this is nearly 750 times longer than humans have existed.

> "We humans had evolved from primate species into what we are today."

Again this is true, except that humans ARE primates. We are classified as part of the Class Mammalia (all mammals), Order Primate (all primates), and Family Hominidae (the "Great Apes", including humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangoutans).

> "1) how come science doesn't match up to the bible?"

Because the bible was written thousands of years ago, by people who did not have the undertstanding of the way the universe operates that we are lucky enough to now possess.

So, they invented stories to explain how things came to be how they peceived them to be. If you want to be generous, then you can say that God dictated a simple series of stories to them , in order that they have a coherent world-view, because there was no way he could explain DNA, the speed of light, gravity, and so on to them.

> "2) If we was created by God, according to the bible, then how come it took humans many years to evolve from "monkeys" into humans, according to science?"

Because the description in the bible is NOT literally true.

The Bible might be an excellent set of rules and parables about how to live a moral life (and even that is debatable - read about Lot and how he treated his daughters), but it is not a scientifically accurate description of the universe.

To hold otherwise - to believe that the bible is LITERALLY true, is called "Biblical Inerrancy":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_in...

> "3) What proof is there that the world was created by God according to the bible, it just doesn't match with science which has proof that dinosaurs existed?"

There is none.

> "4) What is one supposed to believe in?"

Science NEVER involves "belief".

Science is based on EVIDENCE, and the theories are either "accepted" or not accepted: they are never "believed".

Faith involves BELIEF.

Answer 12

1)  Because the Bible was written 2,000 years ago by sheep-hearders.  We've learned a lot since then - and they knew a lot then that the sheep-hearders apparently didn't bother asking about (such as whether the Earth was a sphere - most people already knew it was, but the Bible refers to it as a 'circle', which is flat).

2)  Yep.  One of the premises there must be wrong, and we've only got evidence for one of them.

3)  None at all.  Just an old book.

4)  Religion requires belief because it has no evidence to back it up.  Belief is all it has.  Science requires no belief - you can go try it for yourself.  It always works the same way.  When you've got facts to work with, it's no longer a question of belief - you either accept the facts or you don't.  And if you don't, you can always go repeat the experiments yourself.

Answer 13

1) The Bible was begun by ignorant shepherds who knew much less than scientists have learned 2350 or so years later.

2) The Genesis creation myths are just 2 of many primitive tales that came from the imaginations of ignorant shepherds.

3) There is no proof at all that Yahweh, Marduk, Brahma, or any other deity created anything.

4) I personally believe nothing. I go along with ideas for which there is the most real evidence. That is the way of science, not the way of religion.