But be sure to see http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/etdav/
>From what I've heard, and excellent defense of christianity is presented in
>_Scaling the Secular City_ by J.P. Moreland
It's one of the best evangelical apologetic works I've read.  But
http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/scaling.html 
http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/immortality.html
http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/etdav/
http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/mcdowell/etdav/
Several of McDowell's other books are also criticized at
http://freethought.tamu.edu/criticism/

Ya got that right.  What I'm not sure anyone else has pointed out
is that the incredible "shrinking sun" story is just that -- another
hopelessly distorted creationist fantasy concocted in order to "prove"
that the solar system is very young.
This story is based on a single claim by Boornazian and Eddy several
years ago, who proposed that, based on historical records of solar
eclipses, the sun was shrinking at the above-mentioned rate of 5
feet per hour.  A number of followup experiments were done, all of
which showed that Boornazian and Eddy were just wrong.  Too late,
though, the damage had been done, and another creationist "proof" entered
the folklore.
Anyone who wants to see the rampant dishonesty in this particular
example should read that chapter in the book "Science Held Hostage,"
by Young, Van Till and Menninga. 
 
I've been reading the book of "Numbers," and am puzzled by, well, the
numbers.  At the time of the census, there were approx. 600,000 male
Israelites, ages 20 and up (capable of bearing arms?), not counting the
Levites (about 20,000).  I would estimate that the total population was
about 2,000,000 based on the 600,000 number.  There were also about
20,000 firstborn male children.  This means that, of the 2,000,000
Israelites, only 1% was composed of firstborn male children.  This
seems peculiarly low to me.
Am I not understanding what "firstborn male children" means?
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