Perfect Example of Pomo Epistemology

This offering from our friends at the ever, ever-increasingly appropriately named "Open Source Theology" blog (an ECM group-blog) is a stellar example of the state of Emergent-type epistemology. I believe the opening paragraph says it all:

In 10 principles for reading the Bible in a postmodern context, Andrew proposes that contributors to an emerging post-evangelical theology adopt Principle 2 - "Let’s pretend it’s not inerrant." He suggests that we "set aside claims to the predetermined inerrancy and sanctity of the Bible, at least insofar as such claims force upon us standards of truthfulness that conflict with criteria of thought that we are not prepared to abandon in other areas of discourse (scientific, historical, literary, social, etc.)." Adopting Principle 2 "allows us to read the Bible as the unbeliever reads it; it helps to defamiliarise the Bible for us, which will be an essential aspect of the deconstruction process…" In the Genesis 1 as True Myth post we’ve been trying to make literal sense of the Biblical creation narratives. What if instead we were to read Genesis 1-3 in light of Principle2?

As with everything else I've reat from OST, the post requires no rebuttal; it's self-rebutting.

...and some ECMmers wonder why us iggnit' nukkle-draggin konsirvuhtivs get the willies when reading their stuff...

"Absence of evidence..."

Just watching one of my absolute most favoritest channels, getting ready to go to "tentmaking" to make some $$$ to pay off the publica-- er, that is, the lawyers handling baby Masen's case...

...anyway, the show The Universe was on, a re-run, actually... and I heard a dude who was being interviewed about E.T. say, in response to the apparently insurmountable problem posed by the Fermi Paradox RE: the quest to find other intelligent life "out there". Basically, astronomers have long postulated that the statistical probability of intellilgent civilizations having arisen on worlds orbiting other suns is high enough to be a near-certainty, yet we haven't seen a single shred of evidence of E.T.'s existence - which is troubling to Fox Mulder and others like him.

Anyway, this is, as I'd said, a re-run; I'd seen this episode before. And I'd heard the last time, this one quote that really sparked some thought:

"Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."
- Tom Spilker, JPL

I find that absolutely fascinating... because it really illustrates, I think, the maxim, "he who does not believe in God, it does not mean he will not believe anything - it means instead he will believe... anything."

The same dudes who make statements like the "absence of evidence" regarding E.T. usually nod in rapt agreement with Ricky Dawkins when he makes the converse statement regarding theism.

Lay aside the fact, for the moment, that the evidence for God's existence is truly overwhelming - so much so that it's almost nonsensical to even type that statement out, it's so self-evident. Why does the axiom, "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" work for the search for Starman, but not in discussing the subject of God, I wonder...?