Three of General George S. Patton’s Principles

1. “Never fight a battle when nothing is gained by winning.”

2. “No one is thinking if everyone is thinking alike.”

3. “Know what you know and know what you do not know.”

(Taken from “Patton’s Principles” by Porter B. Williamson)

Having been on both sides of the pulpit, let me voice my strong disapproval of the “god wars!” Science is one of the chief battlegrounds in this warfare. General Patton certainly knew something about warfare. I have inserted three of his principles here in hope that common sense might take hold and that we would stop sabotaging our kids scientific educations due to the secular/religious partisanship. This essay would be a follow up to my: Contrarian Viewpoints... Part 2: Creation vs. Evolution

The big bang theory has been falsified! Science has been deafly silent about this. Why? Are they keeping a secret from us, or can they not definitively speak about origins?

The big bang is THE secular theory about why we are here. If you want to have fun with a non-theist press them for an answer about origins. Chances are that they will always answer it all began with the big bang. When they are stripped of this possibility for an answer….you usually get silence. The right answer here is that we do not know!

Some might say we have always been here, but isn’t this just conjecture? Science has proven that there has been life upon earth for millions of years, but they haven’t established with certainty if there was a point of beginning and how this would have happened. This would have been a long time ago; could we truly ever know? These last two paragraphs refer to Patton’s principle of knowing what we do not know.

Humankind’s presence upon the earth for millions of years rules the “young earth creationist’s” God of the Bible out of the equation. If science could establish with certainty that the earth has always been here; this would do irreparable damage to religion. In this scenario, armed with the knowledge that the earth has always been here science could kill religion if it wanted to. But this hasn’t happened!

The Unasked Question

The unasked question is simply this, “How did we get here?” Science has a most important question to answer. With no definitive answer at this point in history, we cannot rule out the possibility of a creator.

This is another reason why I am not an atheist. But don’t confuse me for one looking for “God,” I have already been there and done that as an ex-minister. What I do know is that there are several man made books with the pretense that they are derived from God. I’ve studied the Bible and there isn’t anything about it that prompts me to believe in a god; in fact it indicates to me that I shouldn’t! It is equally as foolish to take the message of a “Holy Book” and turn it into a textbook of science.

Science hasn’t killed God, nor has it established one either. This is what we know! So lets stop the foolish fighting and teach what we do know rather than a controversy! There is a wealth of wisdom contained within these three principles that theists and non-theists would do well to heed! Patton loved to fight, but not foolishly!

Ex-minister's Blog

Website/Contact Information

Blog page introducing this article & a place to comment upon it