Your tone is delightful.  Glad I struck a nerve.  Glad to see you have some.

When I say atheists want to be left alone, what I mean is we don't want your values shoved down our throats through political means.  I actually thought you intelligent enough to understand that without stating it explicitly, but it just goes to show - atheists can be wrong, too.  So my responding to your statements shouldn't be a surprise (any longer).

As far as the universe being created in 6 days (+1 for a nap - omnipotent omniscient God gets tired, you know!) tell me...how can a day exist before the sun exists?

That was the 4th day, girl.  How do you explain that?  I'll tell you how *I* explain it.  At the time the bible was being written by men, they didn't have a freaking clue that the earth was a sphere, and that it revolved around the sun AND that it revolved on it's own axis (which if you haven't noticed is what REALLY causes day and night, seasons and years.).  These things weren't known for YEARS until guess what happened?  EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE PROVED THEM AS FACT!  Now don't you think if they knew these facts that Genesis 1 might have been written a little differently?

What else would you expect writers of the Bible to say?

I've already told you that God never gets tired nor does he sleep.  Did you not read what I wrote:

To answer your question....the same way it will exist in the future with no moon or sun. 

"and the city had NO need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it for the glory of God did light it and the Lamb is the light thereof.  Rev 21:23

"and there shall be no more night there; and they need no candle neithr light of the sun; for the Lord God gives them light....22:5

Hey smartie pants......guess you don't know it all afterall. 

Soooooo you're going back to the RCC and Galileo correct?  Most atheists love that story. 

If the human writers of God's word were so ignorant as you profess then why did they write this way before it was even discovered that the earth was a sphere?

"It is he that sits upon the circle of the earth and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretches out the heavens as a curtain and spreads them out as a tent to dwell in."   Isa 40:22 written 740-680 BC (well before Galileo was born)'

"He stretches out the north over the empty place and hangs the earth upon nothing."  Job 26:7 (Job is the oldest book in the bible written well before even Isaiah and again well before it was even discovered that the earth was a sphere and hangs on nothing.)

So my question to you, grasshopper, is how did the writers of antiquity know this, before the astronomers did?  Hmmmmm?

Didn't you know you shouldn't take the words of men over God?  Also, please don't try to compare the religionists who didn't know the truth to the truth itself.  The religionists can be in error but the truth....well you know. 

again, another double sided argument.  You do know what that means right? 

Ock:  Newsflash:  Nothing you say surprises me. 

it wasn't a bible when they wrote these things.

So God emits photons?  And I suppose souls have eyes to perceive them with?

Not sure what you mean by the RCC and Galileo story - I'm not an atheist template.

Regarding atheists shoving their values down YOUR throat via political means (which is what I think you are implying by double sided argument)  I'm pretty sure it's just a reaction.  But a reaction to what?  If you guessed centuries of religious control at the hands of people like you, you are correct!

Nice evasion on the day/night thing.  Fortunately, I take the bible literally.  It says "day" and it says "night."  It mentions the creation of the two spherical bodies (one which affects the day/night cycle, and one which has absolutely nothing to do with it) on the 4th day/night cycle.  So for those first three days/nights, did God just emit photons for 12 hours and then take a break for 12?  Funny it isn't mentioned.  Oh yeah...it's mentioned that God is the light, and gives the light, and no sun is required for there to be light because God is it instead - but it never mentions him blinking on and off like a firefly.  So fine - God was the light before the sun was invented.  What was the dark?

The circle of the earth....go outside.  Turn 360 degrees.  That's the "circle of the earth."  A two dimensional figure.

Furthermore, the Earth doesn't hang on nothing.  It hangs, if such an ignorant word should be reused, on the gravitational field generated by the mass of the sun.  From the perspective of an idiot on the surface, however, it certainly would appear to hang on nothing in exactly the same way that it appears to be flat.  The FACT is, it isn't flat, and it doesn't hang on nothing.  The sky isn't a curtain, either, and Hubble has shown that there isn't an "empty place" unless you're talking about the description given by a scientifically ignorant man (which is the simplest solution - Ockham's Razor applies).  But whatever.  I'm sure you've gone into your rationalization WAY before this sentence, so I'll just wait for more of it to spew forth.

I'll spare you. 

Because the astromers of antiquity knew? 

The greeks thought the earth was round, the indians thought the world was round etc.

And don't forget that this is just the examples that we know for certain.  Given that it is possible to work out the shape and size of the world with just two sticks and a sunny day and the knowedge that the world is round has been discovered indipendatly several times it could easily have been far earlier.

Basmas,

Darwinism, thus far, is nothing but one theory after another based upon man's guesses, ideas, and imaginations. So I must ask, What scientific truth of Darwinism?  Please list the "likely" truths of Darwin's ideas.....Darwin's early work showed great "variety within kind" or reshuffling or recombination of genes within kind,  which isn't evolution as per the World Book dictionary definition of it.  

We humans seek a coherent explanation of reality and search the meaning of life. We're confronted with a wide spectrum of ideas....one religiously orientated...that we are the Special Creation of an omnipotent loving God....and one materialistic orientated...that like all other life, we are the product of common "evolutionary" forces operating over an immense period of time.

Back to truth.....we've certainly seen that the very notion of truth has been called into question. Is truth an objective reality or a subjective reality? Does truth depend on a majority vote or is truth beyond the whim of man?

Isaiah and Job wrote before the Greeks.  That was my whole point. 

Let me ask you this Basmas, for your consideration.......

Where did our pattern for a seven day week come from?  Every effect has an adequate cause, right? 

The week has no astronomical basis whatever.  Yet we order our lives in a seven day cycle. The common pattern is six normal working days with one off or change.  How did this system originate?  I mean we know the day is the duration of one rotation of the earth on its axis; the year is the duration of one orbital revolution of the earth about the sun, the month is the approximate interval between new moons as the moon orbits the earth; the seasons are marked by the equinoxes and solstices.  But where does our pattern for the week come from? 

From a Christian POV we have the pattern set for us right from creation but how does a non believer answer this? 

Either darwins essential idea is correct, the truth, or it is not.  There is no subjective to it, nor is it defined by the popular vote.  The popular vote might say that it is wrong, but that would altered the actual truth of it or not.

In this case truth is beyond the whim of man, it is true or it is not.  In the same that god exists or he doesn't, there is a definate answer to it.  Neither question is subjective but both maybe impossible to prove one way or the other.  My point was that even if darwins ideas lead to nasty event happening that is nothing to do with the truth of darwins ideas.

And my whole point was that the idea of the world being round appears to have been formed in a number of different places and time, all indipendantly of each other.  It was in india before the bible got there, it was in greece before they were christian etc.  And they were the ones we knew about.  

It came from the bible.  It was chosen by who know what for who know what reason and spread with christians.  Different cultures chose different lenghts for varying reasons, the different ideas competed but the one chosen by the dominate societies 'won'.  It also does have an astronomical basis.  

'Sidereal month

The period of the Moon's orbit as defined with respect to the celestial sphere (known as esthers) is known as a sidereal month because it is the time it takes the Moon to return to a given position among the stars(Latin: sidus): 27.321661 days (27 d 7 h 43 min 11.5 s). This type of month has been observed among cultures in the Middle East, India, and China in the following way: they divided the sky into 27 or 28 lunar mansions, identified by the prominent star(s) in them.'

28 days, four weeks.

well I wouldn't go so far as say the bible even being a Christian. I mean it's there but the pattern was there first and then recorded.  It was a pattern that was set and has continued.  Why don't we have every 15th day or 19th day or something else off instead of the 7th?  The number 7 is not natural in any way or in any physical way.  It would be more natural to use the number 10 like in the number of man's toes and fingers.  Or maybe the number 12 as in the number of months in the year.  But no, there is almost a universal significance attached to the number 7 as a number speaking of completeness usually with religious overtones.  Why is 7 considered the number of completeness when it seems very unnatural to be so?

not according to astronomy that I know about so can you elaborate? 

where are you getting this information?

The 7 day week originated, so far as I know, from the Babylonians; however, there is evidence to suggest that the Sumerians with their Umma calendar (see: Shulgi) were on top of the concept.

Go check it out KFC, there's evidence other than this to support it.

The 7 day week is simply the best estimate of time between the major moon phases. (New->Half->Full->Half->New) It is a quarter of a lunar month; some might consider it a lunar "season".

To say 10 would be more "natural" would be to suggest it would've been more "natural" for humanity to start with metric. To say 12 would be more "natural" ignores the fact that twelve is appropriate for dividing a year because it is almost the 13 lunar months, but lets each season be an equal length; it also ignores that the number of months has not always been 12 (often changing for political reasons). In what way would 12 or 10 be appropriate for dividing ann approximately 28 day lunar month? If the seven were biblically inspired, why then are the days of the week taken from the "heathen" norse mythology?

Precisely, though are you talking bout the the days of the weeks as per the names, or...?

~Alderic

To that I'll add that God is outside of time, in a state of "timelessness", and that He created time and matter when He created the Universe as laid out in Genesis 1. In this regard, it must be remembered that the concept of a 7 days week comes only from Genesis. Days, months and years, can all be derived from considerations of astronomy, but not weeks.

The 7-day week has no basis outside of Old Testament Scripture! And the reason why is because God wanted to set the example for man. Read Exodus 20:11. In it, God commands His people Israel, to work for 6 consecutive, literal days and rest for one. That's why He took 6 days to create everything and "rested" on the 7th. Our week is patterned after this principle.

The 7 day week as expained has a basis in astromony and the human mind.  As I mentioned there are 28days between the points at which the moon in the same position relative to stars in the sky.

28 days of the week would be far too complicated and all the systems that humans have come up with for weeks are between 5 and 10 days.  7 days is a rather nice quater of the time period that it an easy one to monitor.

the babylions had every 7th as a holy day from a calender 20centryies BC!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylonian_calendar (and othe sources)