You are, of course, absolutely correct in what you say. It is a very easy crack to fall into. I viewed the two factors I set up on the Bible as guides to disprove it, but that can always work the other way around I suppose.-As to not answering your question about cross-referencing, I am almost certain I responded, but just to be certain, I will double check.-And for the point on wandering threads, that is not as unseemly as it may appear at first glance. Things are connected, or more precisely, everything is connected. I think the debate got into genetic variation over an argument I made about early man not being a bunch of cave dwelling advanced apes.

I've been following the debate on ancient civilizations and Hindu texts with great interest, though what on earth it's doing under GENETIC VARIATION I really don't know. Another example of threads running out of control.*** However, I've been struck by the double standards in operation here. I don't want to cause offence, but I venture to hope that all of us are open-minded enough to take a step back and look at ourselves.
> 
> My immediate concern is Balance_Maintained's attack on evolutionists who try to make the facts fit the theory. There are indeed huge gaps in the theory, and although I believe in the general gist, I've also questioned certain aspects of it. B_M in my view is right to demand proof before he believes. However, this sceptical attitude sits uneasily with his approach to biblical and other ancient texts. At the beginning of my own discussion with him, he stated: "I generally start with a few basic premises: A) The Bible does not contradict nature or accurate scientific knowledge; B) The Bible does not contradict itself." So far he has found nothing to contradict these premises. Like modern neo-Darwinists, he starts out with basic premises and seeks support for them, rather than constructing a thesis out of the facts. 
> 
> I'm not going to debate the truth or otherwise of the texts here, and I'm certainly not going to dispute the valuable nature of the research. This is a fascinating and revealing topic. So is evolution. It's the role of preconceived notions I'm looking at, and this seems to me to be symptomatic of many other arguments. The atheists' "God-of-the-Gaps", for instance, with its glorious alliteration, completely ignores the fact that their materialism is based on the gaps in our knowledge of the origin of the universe, of life, of consciousness. I've never come across an atheist yet who will admit that his atheism is based on faith (i.e. that materialism holds all the answers). As I've tried to point out elsewhere, ALL theories are based on filling in gaps, and so we have pots calling kettles black. Likewise, of course, we have theists who claim to "know" the truth ... either by divine revelation or by the authority of their humanly sanctified texts ... who simply ignore all the findings of science, and who accuse their opponents of ignorance and prejudice. There are double standards in operation on all sides.
> 
> Perhaps an awareness of this may be useful to our debate. What I think is not useful is for discussions to be broken off just when things are hotting up. Under INTERPRETATION OF TEXTS, I responded to Matt (29 September at 19.00) and to B_M (30 September at 17.09), who had both raised controversial points relating to the importance of texts and to standards of right and wrong. B_M had issued a kind of challenge to me (ironically, to cast aside my preconceived notions), and I have returned the compliment but received no response, just as I have received no response to my queries about "cross-referencing" and "entire context" (my post of 29 September at 14.15). I suspect that double standards are very much in operation here too ... not deliberately, I hasten to add, but as part of a subconscious process that affects us all. 
> 
> *** May I suggest that in future, if contributors want to start a new topic they open up a new thread. However, before doing so, they should check to see if the subject has already been tackled on an existing thread. It's just as confusing to have ten headings for one topic as it is to have ten topics discussed under one heading.-My Hiatus from the site is somewhat concluded; I've managed to slog through a huge amount of philosophy--I'm far into Martin's attack on Materialism and have started to finish Nietzsche's "Beyond Good and Evil" as well. I also took some time to explore artificial intelligence in order to give you a better answer, which I will do shortly...

--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"