Young Earth Creationism, with its belief that God lied, creating Earth with all fossils already inside, makes any scientific reasoning impossible. You could as well believe that Earth was created yesterday, with all the memories of its history.
This is the total rejection of Reason, which was done by Islam since al Ghazali (1058-1111 AD) and his "Destruction of Philosophers". Today Muslim countries, especially Arab ones, completely lack science.
"In the “physical” part of the Tahafut, al-Ghazali considers two major questions: the repudiation of the necessity of the causal nexus and the resurrection of the body. The former (Question 17) had been one of the major issues which more than two centuries earlier had set the theologians against the philosophers in general and the Peripatetics in particular. The tendency of the latter to ascribe to “secondary causes” a certain degree of efficacy in the natural order was frowned upon by the theologians on the ground that it militated against the Qur’anic concept of an omnipotent Deity who carried out His grand cosmic designs imperiously and directly and who, in consequence, had no need of any mediator.[87] The occasionalist metaphysics of atoms and accidents, which as we have seen was developed by the theologians of the ninth century, was designed precisely to safeguard God’s absolute independence from any conditions or limitations, natural or other. With the exception of a few Mu‘tazilite theologians who introduced the concept of generation (tawallud) as a theoretical device for retaining the efficacy of natural agents,[88] the Muslim theologians rejected “secondary causation” as incompatible with God’s uniqueness and sovereignty in the world. Al-Ghazali, however, was the first theologian to undertake a systematic refutation of the concept of a necessary causal nexus. In this, he appears to have been influenced by the Greek skeptics of the Pyrrhonian school.
The discussion of causality opens with the statement that the correlation between the so-called cause and effect is not necessary, for only where logical implication is involved can a necessary correlation be admitted. It is plain, however, that between two distinct conditions or events, such as eating and satiety; contact with fire and burning, decapitation and dying, no such correlation can be asserted. The observed correlation between concomitant events in medicine, astronomy, and the arts is due merely to God’s action in joining them constantly. It is logically possible, however, for this conjunction to be infringed and the so-called effects be produced ab initio, without their concomitant causes, as indeed happens in what Muslims universally regard as miracles.[90]
Take the case of fire in relation to cotton. The philosophers claim that fire causes the burning of the cotton, whereas we maintain, says al-Ghazali, that the real agent in this process is God, acting either directly by Himself, or indirectly through an angel. For fire is inanimate, and cannot therefore be said to cause anything whatsoever. The only proof that the philosophers can advance is that we observe burning to occur upon contact with fire, but observation simply proves that the burning follows upon contact with fire, not that it is due to it, or that it is in fact the only possible cause of burning."
The problem with Muslims is that they do not believe that the cause must cause the effect. All effects are miracles, and there is nothing except miracles. The effect usually follows cause, but there is no necessity, since God can do anything. So there is no need to try to attain some aim, but it is best to do what the God orders, and leave the results to Him.
I think that Inquisition was often wrong in practice, but was justified in the principle. There are views that cannot be discussed with, since they reject Reason. They can be only fought with. And Young Earth Creationism is especially pernicious, since it is attacking Christianity from within.
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Re: Young Earth Creationism
Date: 2008-10-09 01:24 am (UTC)This is the total rejection of Reason, which was done by Islam since al Ghazali (1058-1111 AD) and his "Destruction of Philosophers". Today Muslim countries, especially Arab ones, completely lack science.
http://www.ghazali.org/index.html
http://www.muslimphilosophy.com/ip/hip.htm
"In the “physical” part of the Tahafut, al-Ghazali considers two major questions: the repudiation of the necessity of the causal nexus and the resurrection of the body. The former (Question 17) had been one of the major issues which more than two centuries earlier had set the theologians against the philosophers in general and the Peripatetics in particular. The tendency of the latter to ascribe to “secondary causes” a certain degree of efficacy in the natural order was frowned upon by the theologians on the ground that it militated against the Qur’anic concept of an omnipotent Deity who carried out His grand cosmic designs imperiously and directly and who, in consequence, had no need of any mediator.[87] The occasionalist metaphysics of atoms and accidents, which as we have seen was developed by the theologians of the ninth century, was designed precisely to safeguard God’s absolute independence from any conditions or limitations, natural or other. With the exception of a few Mu‘tazilite theologians who introduced the concept of generation (tawallud) as a theoretical device for retaining the efficacy of natural agents,[88] the Muslim theologians rejected “secondary causation” as incompatible with God’s uniqueness and sovereignty in the world. Al-Ghazali, however, was the first theologian to undertake a systematic refutation of the concept of a necessary causal nexus. In this, he appears to have been influenced by the Greek skeptics of the Pyrrhonian school.
The discussion of causality opens with the statement that the correlation between the so-called cause and effect is not necessary, for only where logical implication is involved can a necessary correlation be admitted. It is plain, however, that between two distinct conditions or events, such as eating and satiety; contact with fire and burning, decapitation and dying, no such correlation can be asserted. The observed correlation between concomitant events in medicine, astronomy, and the arts is due merely to God’s action in joining them constantly. It is logically possible, however, for this conjunction to be infringed and the so-called effects be produced ab initio, without their concomitant causes, as indeed happens in what Muslims universally regard as miracles.[90]
Take the case of fire in relation to cotton. The philosophers claim that fire causes the burning of the cotton, whereas we maintain, says al-Ghazali, that the real agent in this process is God, acting either directly by Himself, or indirectly through an angel. For fire is inanimate, and cannot therefore be said to cause anything whatsoever. The only proof that the philosophers can advance is that we observe burning to occur upon contact with fire, but observation simply proves that the burning follows upon contact with fire, not that it is due to it, or that it is in fact the only possible cause of burning."
The problem with Muslims is that they do not believe that the cause must cause the effect. All effects are miracles, and there is nothing except miracles. The effect usually follows cause, but there is no necessity, since God can do anything. So there is no need to try to attain some aim, but it is best to do what the God orders, and leave the results to Him.
I think that Inquisition was often wrong in practice, but was justified in the principle. There are views that cannot be discussed with, since they reject Reason. They can be only fought with. And Young Earth Creationism is especially pernicious, since it is attacking Christianity from within.