How can we trust the Bible if it's not inerrant?

[otseng]

From the On the Bible being inerrant thread:

How can you trust something that's written about god that contradictory, contains errors and just plain wrong at times? Is there a logical way to do so, or do you just want it to be god's word so much that you overlook these things like happens so often through the history of christianity?

The Bible can still be God's word, inspired, authoritative, and trustworthy without the need to believe in inerrancy.

For debate:
How can the Bible be considered authoritative and inspired without the need to believe in the doctrine of inerrancy?

While debating, do not simply state verses to say the Bible is inspired or trustworthy.

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Thread Milestones

• Case study of Hezekiah
• Start discussing global flood / Flood Model summary
• Recap arguments of authority of the Bible
• Start discussing Tower of Babel / Tower of Babel summary
• Start discussing archaeology / Philosophy of science / Origin of alphabet / End of discussion on archaeology
• Start discussing cosmology / Concluding cosmology
• Start discussing Shroud of Turin / Summary top TS imaging theories / Created DefendingChristianity.com and TS subforums / Shroud of Turin summary
• Start discussing Bible and resurrection
• Start discussing the Messiahship of Jesus / Messiahship of Jesus wrap up
• Start discussing Old Testament ethics
• Summary argument of atheism and morality / God basis for objective morality
• Start discussing genocide / Genocide summary argument
• Start discussing slavery / Slavery summary argument
• Start discussing homosexuality / Homosexuality summary argument
• Old Testament ethics summary argument
• Start discussing philosophy / Summary argument on philosophy
• Start discussing creation of universe / Summary argument universe was created

[otseng]

What I'm seeing in this thread is an amazement that things act according to their properties, then a jump to concluding a god somehow made all we see.

As I've mentioned, what we are doing to considering all the possible explanations for things we observe. You cannot simply discount any explanation because you do not like the explanation, esp in light of the fact that there really is no naturalistic explanations.

This is faulty, in that what we do see is that humans have a history of concocting gods for all manner of things, up to the point where now it's proposed we have us a god derived from, or composed of the properties of all gods before. Why? As old gods are shown less than needful, as in harvest gods and such, those properties are passed up the chain of gods, until ultimately we get a single god responsible for everything.

People are always concocting answers for things, not just in religion. As a matter of fact, even science does that (as with what we're seeing with the discussion on cosmology, which there is no empirical evidence for inflation, multiverse, space-time fabric, other dimensions, alien life, unobservable universe, etc).

Notice we've seen claims of being the center of a universe where the 'center' may be off by billions of miles. How to fix that? Reduce that number, those billions of miles, to a percentage. The old god doesn't work, so a new one is created.

Not really a good counterargument, esp since I've never claimed how far we are from the exact center of universe and only you have.

This is the problem we have when claims of gods are made. They're nigh on irrefutable because gods are 'ether', 'spiritual', and not bound to the very laws we place on the universe, as in ages, 'creations', and such.

Uh, how are the extranatural explanations for cosmology any different?

So the theist must carry on as if all these 'explanations' are apt, up until science comes along and finds the real explanation.

You have a very high faith in science to believe that.

The better question is how come we trust it when it's so obviously errant?

Please be specific in your claim. What are you claiming is in error with the Bible and how does it affect the authority of the Bible?

[otseng]

[Replying to otseng in post #1522]

The only way the expansion of space-time fabric could allow for clear images is that the expansion was perfectly uniform down to the last location of each subatomic particle in the universe and expanding at exactly the same rate with zero deviation.

Why would this be the case? The universe is mostly empty as far as physical matter, with an average density of just 5e-30 g/cm^3 (eg. Here).

"Location of each subatomic particle" is more of an illustration to show the location of all points in the universe. Matter is not the important thing, but the entire space-time fabric.

Going back to my hypothetical experiment:

Let's do a hypothetical experiment. Suppose the universe has no objects in it except for one light source at position A and one observer at position Z. Light is emitted from A and travels to Z. It has to go through points B, C, ... Y. Each point in between is expanding 3 dimensionally and as it expands it "carries its contents" and would affect the light that is traveling through each point. Suppose each point B - Y is not expanding at the same rate. It would carry the light and deflect it from its path at each point. So, light would not be traveling in a straight line. Now suppose points B - Y are expanding at the exact same rate. Only then would light would be traveling in a straight line.

At points B-Y, there is no matter at those locations, but absolute vacuum. The only two objects in the experiment are at A and Z. But, in order for light to travel in a straight line from A to Z, every point in between would have to expand at the exact same rate.

Spacetime pervades the universe but isn't "made" of anything.

Not only do I believe spacetime is not made of anything, I don't believe such a fabric actually exists in reality, but is only a model.

What I'm arguing is against the idea that space-time fabric can actually be curved or stretched. I agree that it is a model and it can be used to understand things, but it's not an actual thing that can be stretched to explain the extreme redshift of light.

If the space-time fabric is an actual thing, and not just a model, then how can it be stretched at exactly the same rate at every point in the universe? If space-time fabric is just a model and it's not actually stretching, how can the redshift be accounted for?

Most of the galaxies we measure using the redshift technique shows they are farther than it would take for light to travel for the entire age of the universe.

In other words, if the redshift measurement technique is correct, galaxies must be moving faster than the speed of light.

"Eventually, you'll start viewing galaxies that are so far away that the light from them will be so severely redshifted that they'll appear to approach, reach, and even exceed the speed of light beyond a certain distance."
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswith ... 5de02172a2

Most of the Universe we can see is already racing away at faster than the speed of light.

https://www.universetoday.com/122768/ho ... han-light/

97% of the galaxies in the observable universe are moving away from us faster than the speed of light.

So, why do most of the galaxies we observe appear to be moving faster than the speed of light?

If those galaxies are moving away from Earth at nearly the speed of light, you would expect they could only be about 26 billion light-years from Earth when we detected their light of 13 billion years ago. So, those galaxies moved at least an ADDITIONAL 22 billion light-years away in the 13 billion years it took their light to reach us. Is space expanding 1.7 times (or more) the speed of light? I thought the expansion of space itself only exceeded the speed of light during inflation at the very beginnings of the big bang.

This is a really good question, and one that a lot of people – including professional astronomers – have a hard time wrapping their head around.

https://askanastronomer.org/bhc/faq/201 ... han-light/

So, how can cosmologists resolve this? Of course, they add another ad hoc explanation, that the space-time fabric is expanding.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to otseng in post #1526]

The only two objects in the experiment are at A and Z. But, in order for light to travel in a straight line from A to Z, every point in between would have to expand at the exact same rate.

But isn't that the case for short observation times (eg. the time to record an image of a distant object with a telescope)? We know light will not travel in a linear path around massive objects due to the curvature of spacetime as described by GR (general relativity), and of course this has been directly measured many times since the first 1919 eclipse measurements. But if there is no massive object between the source and the telescope, I don't see how light would not travel in a straight line even with a nonlinear expansion rate. This would change the redshift (or create some composite measure of it), but the light could still travel in a straight line absent any spacetime curvature to change that. The spacetime curvature due to a massive body is independent of the general expansion rate as far as I understand any of this.

What I'm arguing is against the idea that space-time fabric can actually be curved or stretched. I agree that it is a model and it can be used to understand things, but it's not an actual thing that can be stretched to explain the extreme redshift of light.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "stretched." Expanding spacetime carries everything with it, so the photons coming to our telescopes are traveling "upstream" within the expansion. The analogy of walking up a downward-moving escalator is in play as it increases the time for the photons to cover a certain distance, which has the effect of "stretching" the wavelengths of the photons (to the red, or longer wavelengths). It is the wavelength of the light that is "stretched" ... not spacetime. This wavelength shift is a manifestation of expanding spacetime, and builds up as the light travels (unlike the Doppler redshift which is cause by the instantaneous movement towards or away from the observer at the instant the photons were emitted). Cosmological redshift is a cummulative effect.

If the space-time fabric is an actual thing, and not just a model, then how can it be stretched at exactly the same rate at every point in the universe? If space-time fabric is just a model and it's not actually stretching, how can the redshift be accounted for?

I think the latest hypothesis is that dark energy (which we don't even understand yet) is the primary cause of the expansion. If dark energy is a "thing", such as energy of some sort or some kind of quantum field acting on matter, then maybe that is the source driving the expansion. I think this is very much an unsolved problem. One thing we do know is that we can measure redshift over a very wide range of values, and get pretty consistent relationships between the distance to objects and their speed of movement relative to Earth. An expanding universe can explain redshift, but exactly what causes the expansion (and its apparent acceleration over time) I believe is still an open problem.

In other words, if the redshift measurement technique is correct, galaxies must be moving faster than the speed of light.

It is not that galaxies are moving faster than the speed of light (they don't), but that spacetime is expanding and carrying them with it. If spacetime was not expanding, then the galaxy redshifts we measure for very distant galaxies would indeed suggest they were moving faster than the speed of light. This article is a good explanation. This one is also good. Whatever spacetime actually is (real "stuff", or just a useful mathematical model), its formulation explains a lot of real observations.

[JoeyKnothead]

What I'm seeing in this thread is an amazement that things act according to their properties, then a jump to concluding a god somehow made all we see.

As I've mentioned, what we are doing to considering all the possible explanations for things we observe. You cannot simply discount any explanation because you do not like the explanation, esp in light of the fact that there really is no naturalistic explanations.

I can, and do, discount claims that're not supported by facts, or logic, or other such confirmatory means.

We can't help but observe the universe "is the way it is", because it's the only universe we have to observe. Time and again, as history shows, gods're proposed as the 'cause' of something, only to have it later discovered it's just natural processes doing what it is natural processes do.

People are always concocting answers for things, not just in religion. As a matter of fact, even science does that (as with what we're seeing with the discussion on cosmology, which there is no empirical evidence for inflation, multiverse, space-time fabric, other dimensions, alien life, unobservable universe, etc).

As I've mentioned, we can toss out everything we know regarding the topics you list, and still have no reason to conclude some sentient entity of unimaginable power is at the root of things.

We don't need to latch onto one failed explanation because other explanations fail.

Not really a good counterargument, esp since I've never claimed how far we are from the exact center of universe and only you have.

Something's either in the center of something, or it ain't. To now include the term "exact" doesn't address the faultiness of saying something's in the center of something, only it ain't.

This is a problem we encounter so often with theists who rely on their interpretation of another's interpretation, of what another interpretator interpretated from yet another interpretator's interpretations.

Uh, how are the extranatural explanations for cosmology any different?

As I don't propose explanations for such, I'm under no obligation to support em.

So, let's quit with the trying to declare the rhetorical my faulty explanation should be considered correct because the rhetorical your faulty explanation doesn't work.

So the theist must carry on as if all these 'explanations' are apt, up until science comes along and finds the real explanation.

You have a very high faith in science to believe that.

I present my position here based on the history of humankind. We see nigh on every day the fruits of scientific labors (good and bad).

The better question is how come we trust it when it's so obviously errant?

Please be specific in your claim. What are you claiming is in error with the Bible and how does it affect the authority of the Bible?
[/quote]
"In the beginning God created..."

With not one bit of confirmatory data.

In its very first verse.

[otseng]

I don't see how light would not travel in a straight line even with a nonlinear expansion rate.

Because of the idea that the expansion of spacetime "carries its contents" as it expands. In my hypothetical experiment, expansion is only in one dimension, but actually it would have to expand in 3 dimensions. If the expansion was non-linear 3 dimensionally, it would carry its contents at the location in a non-linear fashion and thus anything traveling on the space-time fabric would have a non-linear path.

Expanding spacetime carries everything with it, so the photons coming to our telescopes are traveling "upstream" within the expansion. The analogy of walking up a downward-moving escalator is in play as it increases the time for the photons to cover a certain distance, which has the effect of "stretching" the wavelengths of the photons (to the red, or longer wavelengths).

Not so sure there is a concept of an "upstream". Suppose a marble is at the center of a circular rubber sheet and the rubber sheet is expanded equally in all directions. Would there be any direction that is "upstream"?

It is the wavelength of the light that is "stretched" ... not spacetime.

I do not believe that is the case that is proposed by cosmologists. It is the spacetime fabric that is being stretched, not just the wavelength of light. We see this in the estimates of the size of the unobservable universe.

There are various estimates to the size of the unobservable universe. All of them are massive.

This means the unobservable Universe, assuming there's no topological weirdness, must be at least 23 trillion light years in diameter, and contain a volume of space that's over 15 million times as large as the volume we can observe.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswith ... b0d405df80

at present the entire universe's size is at least 1.5×10^34 light-years—at least 3×10^23 times the radius of the observable universe

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

Based on what we currently think about inflation, this means that the Universe is at least 10^(10^30) times the size of our observable Universe!

https://scienceblogs.com/startswithaban ... ervable-un

Even to an infinite size.

The size of the whole universe is unknown, and it might be infinite in extent.

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

If the space-time fabric was not being stretched, then how can the size of the unobservable universe be over 15 million times (to up to infinite in extent) of the distance of the limit light can reach for the age of our universe?

I think the latest hypothesis is that dark energy (which we don't even understand yet) is the primary cause of the expansion.

Dark energy (as well as dark matter) is another ad hoc addition to hold up the theory.

Both dark matter and dark energy are empirically undetectable.

Scientists have not yet observed dark matter directly. It doesn't interact with baryonic matter and it's completely invisible to light and other forms of electromagnetic radiation, making dark matter impossible to detect with current instruments.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/scie ... ark-matter

It is not that galaxies are moving faster than the speed of light (they don't), but that spacetime is expanding and carrying them with it.

Yes, of course, that is why the expansion of the space-time fabric is proposed. And what I'm arguing is there is no expansion of the space-time fabric. So, the next question of course then is, if the redshift is not because of the expansion of the space-time fabric, then what can account for it?

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to otseng in post #1529]

Not so sure there is a concept of an "upstream". Suppose a marble is at the center of a circular rubber sheet and the rubber sheet is expanded equally in all directions. Would there be any direction that is "upstream"?

But suppose the observer is in the center of the circular rubber sheet (eg. a telescope near Earth) and the marble is well away from the center in any random direction. Now expand the sheet in all directions as someone on the marble is pointing a flashlight at the observer. This is more like our situation viewing distant galaxies ... they are all moving away from us in every direction on the very large scales (unlike Andromeda, for example, that is moving towards us). In this case the light from the flashlight that was emitted before the sheet pulling started hits us and passes by at the wavelength the flashlight (or a single-frequency laser would be a better source) emitted. But as the flashlight/laser moves away due to expansion of the rubber sheet the wavelength we measure would get longer over time as the flashlight continued to get farther and farther away, because the flashlight is moving away from the observer.

I do not believe that is the case that is proposed by cosmologists. It is the spacetime fabric that is being stretched, not just the wavelength of light. We see this in the estimates of the size of the unobservable universe.

Yes ... it is spacetime that is expanding (being "stretched"). But the photons are travelling through spacetime and the wavelength lengthening is just a manifestation of them having to travel through an expanding spacetime.

If the space-time fabric was not being stretched, then how can the size of the unobservable universe be over 15 million times (to up to infinite in extent) of the distance of the limit light can reach for the age of our universe?

I'm in the camp that the spacetime fabric IS expanding (being "stretched"), so I accept that explanation for the size of the observable universe.

Dark energy (as well as dark matter) is another ad hoc addition to hold up the theory.

Both dark matter and dark energy are empirically undetectable.

So far they are undetectable directly, but are inferred (hypotheses) because there are observations that require some physics/matter/energy that we don't understand. The mass of the stars visible within a typical galaxy is only about 10 percent of that required to keep those stars orbiting the galaxy’s center based on GR. Some mysterious mass that we can't see ("dark") was proposed to explain how this could make sense, but this is not the only evidence for such "hidden" mass. Gravitational lensing is another type of evidence for dark matter, as well as the observation that the speed with which stars orbit the center of their galaxy is independent of their distance from the center. We don't know exactly what dark matter is yet, but the hypothesis has some evidentiary support. It is an open problem. Like dark energy, the door is open to show that these hypotheses hold up.

Yes, of course, that is why the expansion of the space-time fabric is proposed. And what I'm arguing is there is no expansion of the space-time fabric. So, the next question of course then is, if the redshift is not because of the expansion of the space-time fabric, then what can account for it?

What convinces you that the expansion of spacetime is not a valid explanation for observed redshifts? Are there competing hypotheses out there that are compatible with other aspects of modern cosmology but don't involve spacetime, or the expansion of spacetime? If so, why do they trump spacetime expansion?

[otseng]

As I've mentioned, we can toss out everything we know regarding the topics you list, and still have no reason to conclude some sentient entity of unimaginable power is at the root of things.

We don't need to latch onto one failed explanation because other explanations fail.

If it's the only explanation left standing, it's entirely reasonable to accept it.

This is a problem we encounter so often with theists who rely on their interpretation of another's interpretation, of what another interpretator interpretated from yet another interpretator's interpretations.

I've provided evidence that leads to the reasonable conclusion that we're at the center of the universe. Whereas there is no evidence to show we're not at the center of the universe.

Uh, how are the extranatural explanations for cosmology any different?

As I don't propose explanations for such, I'm under no obligation to support em.

Then you have no justification on excluding any extranatural explanation.

So the theist must carry on as if all these 'explanations' are apt, up until science comes along and finds the real explanation.

You have a very high faith in science to believe that.

I present my position here based on the history of humankind. We see nigh on every day the fruits of scientific labors (good and bad).

Modern science is not really that old, so can't really appeal to the "history of humankind".

But, as for modern science to find explanations for our current topic, cosmology, even it has given up in proposing naturalistic explanations and have to rely on extranatural explanations. So, the train has already left the station on relying on naturalistic explanations in cosmology.

"In the beginning God created..."
With not one bit of confirmatory data.

I've already posted quite a bit of data confirming it with the sheer number of posts on the origin of the universe and fine-tuning. Really, the best way to counter it is showing the universe is infinite in age. And as I've already argued, that is impossible.

[otseng]

But suppose the observer is in the center of the circular rubber sheet (eg. a telescope near Earth) and the marble is well away from the center in any random direction. Now expand the sheet in all directions as someone on the marble is pointing a flashlight at the observer.

Actually, the view I hold is similar to this, but I'll present that later.

I think the issue is resolving how the fabric is being stretched/expanded. There's two ways I can think of. It could be stretched by a force being applied at the edges and pulling it from the edges. Or it could expand by every single point in the fabric simultaneously expanding, like heating a sheet of metal. Are there any other possibilities for the size of the space-time fabric increasing and which of the possibilities is it? For me, I'm assuming it's the latter with each point in the fabric simultaneously expanding.

What convinces you that the expansion of spacetime is not a valid explanation for observed redshifts?

I presented three summary arguments in post 1514.

Are there competing hypotheses out there that are compatible with other aspects of modern cosmology but don't involve spacetime, or the expansion of spacetime? If so, why do they trump spacetime expansion?

Yes, I do have an alternate hypothesis. And I believe it's more reasonable because it flows more naturally from what we observe and introduces less ad hoc explanations. I'll be presenting that later after discussing if the space-time fabric actually exists and can expand.

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to otseng in post #1532]

I think the issue is resolving how the fabric is being stretched/expanded. There's two ways I can think of. It could be stretched by a force being applied at the edges and pulling it from the edges. Or it could expand by every single point in the fabric simultaneously expanding, like heating a sheet of metal. Are there any other possibilities for the size of the space-time fabric increasing and which of the possibilities is it? For me, I'm assuming it's the latter with each point in the fabric simultaneously expanding.

If dark energy (sort of a negative gravity) is responsible for the expansion then it would be much more like a uniform expansion of spacetime (whatever spacetime actually is) everywhere. I can't imagine a scenario where it is "pulled from the edges" ... I've never seen any descriptions that would allow for a mechanism like that. So of these two options I'd think the analogy to heating a piece of metal is much more likely.

But we don't know what dark energy (or matter) even are now, so both are very much at the hypothesis stage waiting for more experimental and observational support. Quantum gravity is another area where physicists are busy trying to have General Relativity and Quantum Physics not be inconsistent with each other at all scales.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... y-made-of/

It appears a lot of this stuff is simply not understood well enough yet to draw any firm conclusions.

[otseng]

If dark energy (sort of a negative gravity) is responsible for the expansion then it would be much more like a uniform expansion of spacetime (whatever spacetime actually is) everywhere. I can't imagine a scenario where it is "pulled from the edges" ... I've never seen any descriptions that would allow for a mechanism like that. So of these two options I'd think the analogy to heating a piece of metal is much more likely.

So, going back to my third argument in post 1514, unless the space-time fabric was uniformly expanding at all locations at exactly the same rate, then there would be distortions in viewing distant objects.

Likewise, if light bends because of space-time fabric distortions, we would not be able to see a clear image of distant objects. But, as the Hubble and Webb telescopes reveal, we do see clear images of the remotest objects.

And uniform expansion at exactly the same rate at all locations in the universe would mean information would have to instantaneously travel to each location in the universe, which would be impossible.

Therefore space-time fabric is not expanding/stretching.

Also, it is not like the space-time as a single entity is even accepted by all physicists.



7:26

I'm thinking more and more in the direction that time is fundamental is not emergent.
Differentiated from space?
Yes.

~ Lee Smolin (American theoretical physicist, a researcher at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and an adjunct professor of physics at the University of Waterloo)