Just a short reply tonight before I go to bed.

First, thanks for the active participation in this thread. Whether wrong or right, each response is a display that someone cares about something, and that's good.

Second, I would point out that evolutionists are very wary of accepting conspiracy theories, yet, if you believe in evolution, you must believe in a grand conspiracy that has spanned thousands of years and involved countless active participants. You have to believe that the Bible is an intricate lie weaved by the hand men with such knowledge and intelligence that they have been able to deceive a considerable percentage of the world population for centuries. You also have to believe that they had the ability and intention to spread this lie using some strange power they had to foretell the future.

You see, I spent the past few years inviting Mormon missionaries into my house to study the Bible and the book of Mormon. I told these missionaries at the very beginning that I am happy to have this dance with them, but that I knew where our feet would land.

I told them that our meetings would end with a difference of opinion about who we believed, in other words, we would disagree about who was telling us the truth and that they would choose the "truth" or "data" they emotionally preferred without investigating further, i.e., denial.

Needless to say, they were confused and wondered why I thought this 2 1/2 year excursion would end this way? I explained (in so many words) that it is because when God created everything, He did something really smart. He made everything connected to everything else.

And why did He do this?

He did this because He hates lies.

So what does this inter-connection have to do with lies?

When you ask an investigator how he determined that Mr. X committed the murder, he will tell you how he was able to piece together the clues from DNA, tire tracks, broken locks, and scratches in expected places. He will tell you that Mr. X must have been at the scene at the appointed time because a witness saw him at the right distance from the scene driving at the right speed and in the right direction. He will tell you that everywhere anyone goes, they leave an unmistakable trail of clues that any honest investigator will recognize.

You see, when seeking truth, you can—over time—eliminate untruth by understanding the underlying set of rules that govern the environment in which you investigating. Only when you understand these rules can you perform an effective investigation.

To apply this principle in the context of this debate, if you say that you believe in evolution, by implication you are saying that you disbelieve the Bible, and this is true because evolution and the Bible are logically mutually exclusive.

So...

If you—by implication—disbelieve the Bible, then you must believe that a grand conspiracy exists between the writers of the text that spans centuries. You must also believe that this conspiracy involved the careful participation of many witnesses and untold scientists from different fields, different places, and different times who have made discoveries that confirm Bible texts that could not have otherwise been known.

You see, because all truth is connected, you cannot—without hypocrisy—believe two truths that are mutually exclusive. So the debate should (but won't) end with one party reexamining two of their inner beliefs which are in direct conflict with each other.

To make this clear, you have to either

(1) accept that the Bible is a grand conspiracy, or

(2) that evolution is a grand conspiracy, or

(3) that both are grand conspiracies.

Of course, you can only morally do any of these if you have adequate knowledge of both.

You have two other options:

(1) You can go into denial purposefully forgetting the conflicting logic simply pretending that it doesn't exist, or you can claim ignorance and never do the research necessary to reconcile the conflict (i.e. - "I don't know the Bible so there's nothing I can do"), but this option is really a subset of the first (remember "willfully ignorant"? ), or

(2) if you don't know the Bible and If you want to be both intellectually honest and passionate about truth, you could pick up the Book and check it out for yourself.

So...

If you hold to your position that the Bible is not true, then the logical conclusion is that you have already chosen your preferred conspiracy. Indeed you've chosen the global one spanning centuries rather than the multinational one spanning a 150 years.

Now you should realize that since I've heard some of you poking fun (to put it lightly) at the idea of conspiracies and effectively saying that you don't believe they exist (at least in reference to evolution), you have a logical dilemma. In a good game of chess (that is if you follow the rules), this is called checkmate.

However, just as in the story with the Mormon missionaries, I know how the story ends. The person with the conflicting faiths will choose to default to the position that there is something unknown which will remain unknown.

For example, they may claim that the Bible and evolution are not mutually exclusive. They may even reach for the stars and complicate the issue and say, "How can we really know anything?" If one does not know the Bible and chooses to not to study it, both of these decisions are intellectually immoral and sell the decision-maker short of the great award that would have otherwise awaited him just on the other side of this pursuit of truth.

No matter which path you choose, it is truly amazing how a search for truth begins by forcing us (if we're humble enough) to take a hard look at the contradictions within ourselves, i.e., our selfishness or "sin". This search for truth is really a process that purifies us by allowing us to really know ourselves, if we are humble enough to persist through it (know thyself).

So, the Mormon missionaries went on their way, and being some of the nicest and most honest people I know, they informed me of their decision to our dance of dilemma.

They chose denial.

Ironically they never realized that in some intimate way, I knew them better than they knew themselves.

Now, sadly I live with this truth:

Until the day they decide to finish the pursuit of truth that we started, they will never know how well I knew them and how much I cared for them, knowing the end from the beginning.