Chinese scientist He Jiankui defends 'world's first gene-edited babies'

[Kevin L]

Guys . . . I revere the Bible, but that doesn't mean that I buy into Biblical literalism.

Biblical literalism and reverence toward the Bible are two different things.

When Benjamin Franklin invented the lightning rod, it was considered profane because lightning was from God.

The pious people of Brescia, Italy decided that God would never hit the church with lightning, so that was the safest place to store all the gunpowder . . . almost 100 metric tonnes of it.

The steeple (the highest point in town) was struck by lightning, and the explosion killed almost 3,000 people and destroyed 1/6 of the town.

Biblical objections to evolution are--to me--the same as Biblical objections to lightning rods (or blood transfusions, if you're a Jehova's Witness).

It may seem nonsensical to believe in both outlooks, but God never promised us that He would conform to our expectations.

And--just to make my position clear--Jesus preached moral flexibility.

As an example, consider the adultress who was about to get stoned to death.

 

[TexasFreedom]

Brent,

Let me be clear, and specific. You said:
When the group assigned by King James put together all the scrolls that were known at the time, they basically threw out or omitted many. The ones that made the Bible are what we know today, but there are lots that had different versions. One said Mary had married Jesus, and there were lots of other controversial versions.

I asked (and asked again):
Can you point to where the King James translation deleted something that said Jesus married Mary?

And yet you still haven't answered the question nor provided anything, even a morsel to support your statement. The problem is that you think you know things and they aren't true. That's called believing the lie. That did not happen, and you can't find anything that supports that statement.

And your links lack any sense. "The life of Adam and Eve" written in Greek? Why is that not written in Hebrew? Why isn't it part of the Old Testament? Complete lack of credibility there.

And on the age question, we were talking about the age of the earth/universe. You mention a link talking about 10 ways of dating 'young' (thousands of years) items? Even of those 10, one (ice cores) has long ago been proven to be inaccurate. So let me repeat the challenge. There are not reliable methods of dating billion-year-old things. Are you confused about this?

And Kevin, Christ never preached moral flexibility, but he did preach forgiveness. Your example is a clear illustration: He told her to go and sin no more. He did not condone her sin in any way. You should look through the NT again. You will see example after example of where Christ loved us, sinners. Where he forgave us, where he taught us, where he corrected us. And there are other illustrations where for instance the fig tree did not produce fruit, and it died. But you will not find one example where he said sin was 'flexible'. Sin is sin and requires forgiveness, and repeat sins are not forgiven.

 

[Kevin L]

I guess it depends upon your definition of flexibility.

Mosaic law was quite clear on the matter--Adulterers must be stoned.

Other than a codicile about sparing the adulter woman from being stoned if she was in the countryside, as there would be no one to hear her if she cries out . . . adulterers get the death penalty.

By arranging for her to be spared stoning (admitedly through their own shame), he broke the law.

I don't believe that the purpose of the Bible was to give us a black and white standard of absolute right and wrong.

You see, if you quote parts of the Bible, you can justify almost any mean, disgusting act. The KKK uses parts of the Bible to justify terrorism, and the peace-loving Quakers use other parts of the Bible to justify feeding the poor and emancipating slaves.

It all comes down to what kind of a person you are.

I, for one, believe that absolute rules let a coward do horrible things and then shield himself from censure or punishment because "he was only following orders".

Following absolutes of right and wrong . . . and doing the right thing are often two very different principles.

When Jesus protected the adultress from being stoned, he was breaking the law . . . but He was also doing the right thing.

That's what I mean by moral flexibility.

 

[TexasFreedom]

Kevin,

I look at it quite differently. Christ forgave her sin. And he didn't 'arrange for her to be spared'. He said to the men who were ready to stone her, for a sinless man to be the first to throw a stone. They dropped their stones and left. It was their job to stone her, so if anyone 'broke the law' it was them. But Christ has the power to forgive sin, and he did so afterwards.

But I do agree with you that legalism is not the path God wants. In fact that was the problem with Jews at the time of Christ.

Quoting the Bible isn't the problem, the problem is quoting only one part of the Bible and ignore others. Every group that goes astray do this.

Following absolutes of right and wrong . . . and doing the right thing are often two very different principles.

I think both parts of your statement have truth. There are absolute rights and wrongs. But there can be times to read between the lines. For instance, helping someone in need is not the same thing as buying a drink for a drunk. Another example is that living as the LGBTQ lifestyle is wrong, period, absolutely.

 

[DrHenley]

You have to understand that there is not one set of manuscripts, but many sets of manuscripts that were used to compile the Bible. Translations of the Bible don't build on previous translations, they use the earliest and most reliable manuscripts available. Biblical scholars look at the manuscripts and try to determine which are the most authentic. Some translators DO color the translation to fit a particular ideology, but the problem with that is that the original text is available to everyone, and you can buy "Parallel Bibles" that have a word for word literal translation of the original text side by side with the translation.

Since the time of King James we have found older manuscripts, and are able with modern science to better verify the sources, and are able to get the translation more true to the original texts. When it is determined that something was added after the fact, that is noted in the newer translations.

Some of the most reliable early manuscripts do not have the passage about the adulterous woman. It is now believed by most Biblical scholars that it was added later. In the New American Standard, for example, John 7:53-8:11 is in brackets with the footnote:

Later mss add the story of the adulterous woman, numbering it as John 7:53-8:11

In the New International Version, the section is in italics preceded by this note:

[The earliest manuscripts and many other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:53—8:11. A few manuscripts include these verses, wholly or in part, after John 7:36, John 21:25, Luke 21:38 or Luke 24:53.]

The Dead Sea Scrolls were a tremendous boon to Biblical Archaeology because they were written between 300 BC and 100 AD, and so were earlier - and thus less likely to have been tampered with - than most of the manuscripts we had.

 

[tmttactical]

Darn glad I am agnostic. I could get my debating butt whipped from both sides of this debate. I think I will play like Switzerland, neutral.

 

[Kevin L]

Kevin,

I look at it quite differently. Christ forgave her sin. And he didn't 'arrange for her to be spared'. He said to the men who were ready to stone her, for a sinless man to be the first to throw a stone. They dropped their stones and left. It was their job to stone her, so if anyone 'broke the law' it was them. But Christ has the power to forgive sin, and he did so afterwards.

But I do agree with you that legalism is not the path God wants. In fact that was the problem with Jews at the time of Christ.

Quoting the Bible isn't the problem, the problem is quoting only one part of the Bible and ignore others. Every group that goes astray do this.


I think both parts of your statement have truth. There are absolute rights and wrongs. But there can be times to read between the lines. For instance, helping someone in need is not the same thing as buying a drink for a drunk. Another example is that living as the LGBTQ lifestyle is wrong, period, absolutely.

Even from the perspective of a devout, conservative Christian (which I'm not), I can imagine situations where the Christian condemnation against homosexuality is wrong.

There are people who are born with ambiguous genitals, and ambiguous chromosones. Often they are surgically "corrected" at birth, and then what happens is that they hit puberty and find that they are attracted to their same gender...a gender that was selected by a human (and flawed) surgeon.

Should such people be condemned to a life of loneliness and solitary isolation because of a birth defect? That doesn't seem very Christian to me.

Likewise, there were instances in WWII during periods of extreme scarcity when desperate people exchanged sexual favors (with their same gender) to obtain food and medicine...as a last resort to prevent starvation.

I'm a straight male, but I would consider such a course of action if I had to save my (hypothetical) child's life, and I wouldn't think that this would make me less of a Christian.

There are other circumstances that I could come up with if I wished to sit and ponder such things (I don't), but I'm sure you get my point.

 

[tmttactical]

There is only one absolute in life, you are not getting out of it alive.

I really don't care about the gay community. They are do not rate special status or less treatment than the heterosexual community. Which means they do not rate any special protections. Baker does not want to bake my wedding cake because I am heterosexual, then I take my business else where. I don't cry, whine and sue them. I don't hold parades to announce I am straight. I do not ask or demand special dispensation from government or society. Is my status recognized as the normal, of course it is, as with any factor that holds the majority. That does not make me special, just simply in the majority. I have a neighbor couple that are lesbians, they appear to be nice people and have not caused me any trouble, so I have no reason to complain. They have the cutest little boy, with perfect manners. It is none of my business how they got the little boy, he is well treated, clothed, clean and most importantly happy. So who am I to judge. With that being said, I still think that it would be better if their was a father figure in his life. There is a down side to being gay and it usually involves the children. Male and female do provide different prospective and insights and I don't believe that can be accomplished by same sex parents. Just my 2 bits.

 

[Maverick]

I kindly stayed out of the argument regarding religion, it serves no purpose, I believe in the Bible, but I am not going to chastise if one believes or not, each person is free to come to there own conclusions for what ever reason they may have and live how they choose. I’M NOT THE JUDGE, I have no rights to that power.

In the end;
Their are many upon many things we do agree with regardless of how we choose to believe and that’s what I value here.

Maybe this should have been posted in Politics and Religion section :-/

 

[Brent S]

Agreed, this was the wrong place for this discussion. And since most have a concrete mindset to begin with, all this is probably senseless anyways.

 

[TexasFreedom]

I agree with all the statements that faith is exactly that, faith. Facts/evidence will take all of us so far, but what goes beyond that is the unknown.

I have no problem where each person goes beyond facts.

I have a problem when people distort facts or just blatantly make up lies to support their position. And that's true from all sides, I rebuke Christians when they say things that would support Christianity IF they were true.

And that is exactly what Brent did, he wrote about how the King James translation deleted all sorts of parts from the Bible including Mary & Jesus marrying. That would look great for arguing against Christianity, IF it were true. I've stated repeatedly that it's not true and asked him to provide evidence to support his statement. He hasn't. I agree this discussion should be the politics/religion section, and I'll start it over there for anyone interested in following.

 

[Brent S]

I agree with all the statements that faith is exactly that, faith. Facts/evidence will take all of us so far, but what goes beyond that is the unknown.

I have no problem where each person goes beyond facts.

I have a problem when people distort facts or just blatantly make up lies to support their position. And that's true from all sides, I rebuke Christians when they say things that would support Christianity IF they were true.

And that is exactly what Brent did, he wrote about how the King James translation deleted all sorts of parts from the Bible including Mary & Jesus marrying. That would look great for arguing against Christianity, IF it were true. I've stated repeatedly that it's not true and asked him to provide evidence to support his statement. He hasn't. I agree this discussion should be the politics/religion section, and I'll start it over there for anyone interested in following.

Yet I did show you that there are texts that didn’t make the Bible when they assembled them into it. Some were stories about Mary and Jesus. You can see,or not see, what you want. Simple online research can find the books omitted. I spent about 30 seconds pulling up the link I posted. Also, this was not about arguing against Christianity, but just showing where man wrote these scrolls, and man assembled them from many different writings.

 

[jontte]

there are nothing more volatile than talking about politics or religion..
better for me to keep my nose out of it..

 

[Kevin L]

Finally, something that we seem to agree on.

I rose to the bait when religion came up, so perhaps everyone was right about this being the wrong thread.

Also--as was said earlier--I'm never going to change peoples' minds on this subject, so it's kind of futile to try.

I apologize for creating the diversion.

 

[jontte]

well,it wasn't you who directed religion to this thread.

 

[Proud Prepper]

Yet I did show you that there are texts that didn’t make the Bible when they assembled them into it. Some were stories about Mary and Jesus. You can see,or not see, what you want. Simple online research can find the books omitted. I spent about 30 seconds pulling up the link I posted. Also, this was not about arguing against Christianity, but just showing where man wrote these scrolls, and man assembled them from many different writings.

Brent, there were no books that stated Jesus and Mary where married, but some lines in those other books did give a slight impression that they were somewhat more than the books of the new testiment state. And then there are books that hypothisize that the two where husband and wife and even had children. Thats probably where your getting the 2 mixed up.

 

[DrHenley]

The process of translating, and understanding the cultural context of the Bible can be discussed separately from religious arguments, and I have tried my best to discuss this from a scientific, historical and archaeological perspective, not a religious one. I believe a well informed Atheist could have posted most of the same information.

 

[user 7704]

Speaking of feeding people, NatGeo (magazine) did an article on ugly food that is just thrown away because it is misshapen. People were trying to get it go use for the poor or for animals.

That's how the whole baby carrot thing came about. They aren't babies at all, just ground down until they are uniform in shape.

I get some wildly shaped veggies in my garden, but we eat them. Some we take pictures of first, then eat.

 

[KateMTx]

I don't have any problem with gene therapy treatments on consenting individuals to treat diseases like cystic fibrosis or certain cancers. This alters the genes of only certain cells in their body affected by the disease but does not affect reproductive cells so any potential offspring are not affected. Altering the genetics of an embryo is a completely different matter and affects an unsuspecting individual and most likely any offspring they might have, so mistakes the geneticist make will be reproduced as well. This has potential for all sorts of problems.

 

[tmttactical]

@KateMTx

I have to agree completely with your statement. That is the whole problem with this type of research, it opens Pandora's box to the unexpected and quite possible undesirable results.

 

[Maverick]

The problem, gene therapy may correct the ailments in the person being treated with consent but like many unexplained diseases, the problem may not be seen for the next 3 generation. The consenting person may have the right to the treatment and it may work... for him but create undesirable affects 2 3 4 generations down the road, who is held liable or does it not matter? if it could be proven at all. We are opening up the abyss of the unknown! Each human is genetically different, yes we all have some genes that are common with one another but we also have unique genes that make us as individuals (besides the environment we were raised in) how do we create check and balances of the unknown?

 

[Brent S]

there are nothing more volatile than talking about politics or religion..
better for me to keep my nose out of it..

Amen

 

[tmttactical]

One of the great things about this forum, folks can actually debate without calling each other names.

 

[KateMTx]

The problem, gene therapy may correct the ailments in the person being treated with consent but like many unexplained diseases, the problem may not be seen for the next 3 generation. The consenting person may have the right to the treatment and it may work... for him but create undesirable affects 2 3 4 generations down the road, who is held liable or does it not matter? if it could be proven at all. We are opening up the abyss of the unknown! Each human is genetically different, yes we all have some genes that are common with one another but we also have unique genes that make us as individuals (besides the environment we were raised in) how do we create check and balances of the unknown?

That's why I said I approve of gene therapies that do not affect the reproductive cells (sperm/eggs). If the DNA of those cells is not affected, then it won't affect future generations, only the one on whom the therapy is performed. I do understand the reservations still, because of the new understanding of how small changes during reproduction can turn on/off certain genes. However, I think that as technologies develop we will be able to adjust this, as long as we have not altered the entire genome. This is just my perspective based on my reading and understanding of scientific literature and others are free to disagree with me and provide me with evidence to the contrary.

 

[Maverick]

Good Grief

Scared Your DNA Is Exposed? Then Share It, Scientists Suggest

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...a-is-exposed-then-share-it-scientists-suggest

 

[tmttactical]

Hide your persona DNA in a central data bank is like telling people to go naked to avoid sunburn. AND this advice is published in the Journal of Science. AND we are to believe their models on Global Warming too.

 

[TexasFreedom]

I too saw that article about scientists wanting everyone's DNA.

Of course they do. And bank robbers would like everyone's bank account numbers & PINs and social security number.

True story. A friend was raised by a stepfather. 40 years later through chance he 'found out' who his father is & his mother confirmed that. A few years ago he did the DNA test with his 'father' only to find out there is no relation, but the 'system' told him he has a 1/2 sister in Georgia! Turns out her father lived near his mother back then.

Imagine the problems this can present. Obviously errors are first. But consider the turmoil this can cause. Consider a living will that says each of his surviving children get a part of the inheritance. Consider the opportunity for fraud.

No thank you.

 

[Gazrok]

I see nothing wrong with using this technology to eliminate disease and defects in the unborn, for those who can afford it. Who wouldn't?

It won't stop there though. We'll also tinker to see if we can make them faster, stronger, smarter, etc. I fear in the end, we'll end up with a nearly sterile population many generations into the future, and without the minute random mutations that nature uses to make us all more adaptable.

But again though, the AI robots will be in control before that, and probably end up using us all as batteries ala the Matrix, so there's that. Plug me back in Morpheus.....

 

[Gazrok]

I too saw that article about scientists wanting everyone's DNA.

Of course they do. And bank robbers would like everyone's bank account numbers & PINs and social security number.

Right? Hey, here's a key to the house while you're at it.....

 

[KateMTx]

It won't stop there though. We'll also tinker to see if we can make them faster, stronger, smarter, etc. I fear in the end, we'll end up with a nearly sterile population many generations into the future, and without the minute random mutations that nature uses to make us all more adaptable.

But again though, the AI robots will be in control before that, and probably end up using us all as batteries ala the Matrix, so there's that. Plug me back in Morpheus.....

Brave New World on a whole new scale. All the humans will be genetically engineered and then grown in labs.