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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 2:51:54 PM
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mushhead
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Hey RC, great topic!
Zhi, likewise, your post was excellent; well written, filled with useful and accurate info.
Now for a response to some of the issues raised here:
quote:
ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes
Some people say that friends shouldn't discuss religion or politics. Maybe Christians shouldn't discuss the age of the world/universe. Too many Young Earth Creation folks say Old Earth Creation folks couldn't possilbly be saved, they don't believe the Bible. Too many OEC folks say that YEC folks are, well, just dumb. Or that's how it appears to me anyway. I do not believe that anyone's belief about the age of the Earth has anything to do with their salvation, nor does their interpretation of Genesis. I do believe that God has not made the universe appear to look older than it is, that would be a lie, something God will not do, and has not done.
God does not lie, and God did not make the universe look older than it is.
I am reminded of scene from the movie "A Knight's Tale." William (Heath Ledger), the main character, learns he is about to joust with Prince Edward, who is jousting under an assumed name. William should withdraw, but does not. After the first run, his herald chastises him for, "...knowingly endangering a member of the royal family." William replies, "He knowingly endangers himself."
Much in the same way, God has done nothing to deceive mankind, instead mankind deceives himself by attempting to find an explaination for the existance of the world that does not include God. For example: God created Adam as an adult male. On the eight day, Adam would have been two days old. Now let's imagine that a scientist jumped into a time machine and went back to the eighth day (I know this is crazy, but please don't lose sight of the main point) and ran tests on Ada. He would conclude that Adam was [just picking an age] thirty something. Therefore, the scientist would say the earth had to be at least thirty years old, when it was actually only eight days old.
The scientist's error is not based on God misleading anyone, rather it is based on the scientist trusting his own observations rather than trusting God's word.
quote:
I believe that the earth is 4.5 billion years old, the universe 14.5 billion years old, just like the geologists say. Too much evidence for me to believe otherwise. I don't care what other people believe about the age of the earth, not much anyway, because it doesn't matter.
You're right that what one believes about the age of the earth probably doesn't matter that much, but what we believe about death before the "Fall" does matter.
quote:
ORIGINAL: rcjames
I guess it is not the "Day" interpretation that might give me pause, but this passage;
(Gen 1:1) In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
(Gen 1:2) And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
There could well be a gap between those two verses of a day, a year, an eon, or whatever.
One problem with the "Gap Theory" is it raises the question why God would take a very long time to form the earth, but create the sun and everything else in a day.
quote:
I believe that the earth is 4.5 billion years old, the universe 14.5 billion years old, just like the geologists say.
What evidence? Have you heard of the strata and other geological formations that geologists believed required millions and billions of years to form, which formed in a few short months after the Mount St. Helen's eruption? The problem with old earth theories is they are based on an agenda to remove God from any explaination of the univers's existance. The same evidence that is used to support the "old" theory can also be interpreted to explain the "young."
< Message edited by mushhead -- 8/7/2008 3:08:25 PM >
_____________________________
MUSHHEAD
Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces. Matt. 7:6
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:03:23 PM
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Peter_Gunn
Posts: 706
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Good thinking, Mush!
I'm not scientifically minded, at all...but I once saw carbon dating being explained and it just seemed so loose to me. How can you date something God-made using man-made parameters?
Maybe I'll just never be a scientist!
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:18:40 PM
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cow451
Posts: 3968
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Peter_Gunn
quote:
ORIGINAL: gluadys
Some of us like to call ourselves "evolutionary creationists".
I have a question I've always wanted to ask of an "Evolutionary Creationist"...maybe you can answer it.
How do you understand the wording in several verses in Genesis 1..."and God saw that it was good"? And in verse 31, referring to all He had made, God "saw that it was very good."
I've always wondered this...if God is omniscient and if He was pleased with all He had made at the point of Genesis 1:31, why would He have created things just to have them change...or evolve?
Would an omniscient God not create HIS own creation completely, with no need for evolvement or change?
Even YEC's believe that the earth and species have "evolved and changed".
And would an omniscient God require rest or would He go for an evening walk through the garden?
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:21:28 PM
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essentialsaltes
Posts: 1063
Joined: 10/14/2007
From: Inglewood, CA
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quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
The problem with old earth theories is they are based on an agenda to remove God from any explaination of the univers's existance.
This is not true. As an example, one of the first semi-reliable dates for the age of the earth was calculated in 1862 by Lord Kelvin, who placed the age of the earth in the millions of years. Lord Kelvin was a fervent Christian, and believer in a creator God. Lord Kelvin certainly had no such agenda; nor do those scientists who have confirmed and improved his dating of the earth as 'old'.
_____________________________
"My object in all arguments is not to make any preconceived opinion of mine seem right, but merely to discover and establish the truth, whatever the truth may be."
-- HP Lovecraft, letter to Robert E. Howard 7/27-28/34
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:22:07 PM
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mushhead
Posts: 515
Joined: 5/29/2005
From: Kearns
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Peter_Gunn
Good thinking, Mush!
I'm not scientifically minded, at all...but I once saw carbon dating being explained and it just seemed so loose to me. How can you date something God-made using man-made parameters?
Maybe I'll just never be a scientist!
Thanks Peter_Gunn. I enjoy studying science, but I too would have a problem being a part of the modern scientific community.
Zhi,
I have a question you might be able to answer: I read somewhere that radiometric or carbon dating often produces wildly varying conclusions. As a consequence, scientists are forced to make "educated" guesses about which date is correct. I even read a quote from a graduate level text book written by a prominent geologist (don't remember the tile or author) supporting this claim. Is it true that dating techniques typically produce [wildly] varying results?
_____________________________
MUSHHEAD
Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces. Matt. 7:6
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:27:05 PM
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drj11
Posts: 632
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quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
The scientist's error is not based on God misleading anyone, rather it is based on the scientist trusting his own observations rather than trusting God's word.
Then why are there Christian scientists? They seem to believe both and have no qualms with either. However, they understand scripture in a fundamentally different way than a literalist does.
quote:
What evidence? Have you heard of the strata and other geological formations that geologists believed required millions and billions of years to form, which formed in a few short months after the Mount St. Helen's eruption? The problem with old earth theories is they are based on an agenda to remove God from any explaination of the univers's existance. The same evidence that is used to support the "old" theory can also be interpreted to explain the "young."
Its really saddening to see this myth (in bold) so prevalent, when it is so obviously false it doesnt hold up to even the slightest scrutiny. When did people become so fearful of science? The fields of science are populated by people of all walks of life, including Christians. Christians who believe in an old earth and even study evolution. Do they have an agenda to remove God from any explanation of the universe? I don't think so. Lets stop spreading this vicious lie.
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 3:50:01 PM
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Zhi
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quote:
I would stand more with your husband on the accuracy of radiometric dating, especially isochron dating which you do not mention.
Well, I didn't want to list every single theory out there. It would get too long. But, since you asked, let's discuss isochron dating.
The problem with this is that isochron dating is somewhat subjective, and is extremely sensitive to contamination. Contamination is obviously going to be pretty problematic out in the "dirty world" where you don't really get closed systems. Another problem is that the lines are never perfect, and outliers tend to get tossed because they don't "fit". So, the person attempting to make the graph has to determine what they believe are the "real" isochron points, and which ones are spurious. Generally, they do this based on how old they "think" it is and whether or not their results are landing where they "should", which is based on their initial assumptions anyway. Furthermore, the method assumes that the samples used all formed simultaneously from a more or less homogeneous material set, which is just as unreliable as trying to guess how much parent you started with.
The thing is, though, that for a true "young earther" insisting on a 6,000 year period since the earth was formed, the entire thing is basically moot... because by necessity the processes involved simply did not have time to happen. So, God would have had to create the rocks in an "old" (or if you would prefer, "finished") state in order to have everything in the proper formation for the following creation... a molten, still-cooling earth in the morning could not have supported plants in the afternoon without supernatural intervention, right?
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The micro-macro difference you outline is based on a misunderstanding of the predictions of evolution. It would actually disprove evolution if the descendants of moths were not moths, the descendants of birds were not birds, etc. Evolution requires that where no gene flow is possible between groups there will be no evolutionary consequence which will take descendants out of the groups their ancestors are part of.
The issue is that at some point, something has to stop being A, in order to be B. A lizard eventually has to stop being a lizard, and start being a bird. A fish has to make its way onto land eventually, along with the necessary structures to do so. There should be massive evidence of the various stages in the fossil record, but the reality is that we have very little, and instead we have anomolies such as the Cambrian Explosion, where evolution would have had to speed up exponentially.
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I would also disagree with the theology that says God's image cannot be imparted to a species which evolved or that evolution poses a problem to the fact of the fall. But that is still another discussion.
And an interesting discussion that would be. I would point out, though, that even the impartation of God's image to something pre-existing (which happens in the creation story with "dust of the ground") still means that humans could not have evolved, per se, because divine intervention was required to make humans human. So, whether the divinely gifted step was dirt->man or apelike thingy->man, the step was certainly not an evolutionary step.
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What I would point out is that for radiocarbon dating, the system can be calibrated against tree rings going back to about 10,000 years ago. Tree rings provide a much more direct measurement of age, and this can be used to directly measure the rate of radiocarbon formation in the atmosphere. When this is done (see Fig. 1) the curve does not deviate that far from the 'naive' straight-line assumption.
So even if we ignore this calibration, our dates for the past 10,000 years are only off by a few percent. With the calibration, the accuracy is even better.
Using varve sediments, another calibration can be made for radiocarbon, and though it's not as clean as dendrochronology, it shows reasonable linearity for the past 40,000 years (see Fig. 2, etc.). Of course, 40,000 years already falsifies a 6000 year old earth, and this conclusion is supported by dendrochronology, varves, and radiocarbon dating separately.
I think your figure got lost in the copy paste. >.> <.<
Using tree rings makes certain assumptions regarding climate and seasons. As I'm sure you're aware, the cambium usually grows more quickly during spring (when there is plenty of moisture and light) to form lighter wood. Then, as fall comes along, growth slows and the smaller, denser cells of that season appear darker due to a lack of light and moisture. So, anything that affects light, or moisture, could affect ring formation. Furthermore, we don't have any trees that are proveable to be more than 4,500 years old, that being the age of the oldest tree we've found (specifically California's "Methuselah tree"). Comparisons of dead trees and attempting to line up the rings in order to try to figure out what goes farther back where, is rather... subjective.
Varve sediments have the same problems... the assumption that the laminar deposits indicate seasonal deposits is also going to depend on what else is happening in the climate at the time. Flooding, windstorms, even fluctuations in pH balance can create varve sedimentation that is basically indistinguishable from the seasonal formations.
quote:
But more importantly, radiocarbon dating appears to be roughly 'linear' in the sense you mean for the past 40,000 years (just about the entire span of time for which it is used). It may be off by 10% or even 20% for all I know, but clearly not the 700% that would be required to squeeze the time frame down to 6000 years.
It's true that it is not as easy to calibrate the other radiometric dating methods (which provide billion-year ages for rocks) against some other method in the same way. But to squeeze billions of years into thousands would require decay rates to increase by a factor of a million, which would just about turn a rock into a nuclear bomb.
Well, of course it "appears" to be roughly linear... because the assumptions regarding it assume that it is linear. So, if you assume something is linear, chart it as linear, even if it's not really linear, it's going to look linear.
So, again, the decay rates do not need to increase if the original assumed ratios of the parent and daughter elements are incorrect.
quote:
And for your point #4, that we may not know the correct mother/daughter ratios in the original rock, some methods, like zircon dating, provide two separate radiometric methods of dating the sample. If assumption #4 was false, then the data would not fall on the concordia curve, except by an unlikely accident.
The problem with zircon dating is that zircons are resistant to thermal changes and tend to be more difficult to, well, melt, than the other rocks with them. So, detrital zircons can just as easily come from sedimentary recycling as from formation in the current strata. Zircon is not resistant thermally in one sense, though, specifically that heating can cause the lead to diffuse out of the crystal, thereby changing the ratio of lead to uranium. Furthermore, zircon is difficult to analyze as the formations tend to be very, very tiny, and it can be difficult to distinguish overgrowth from core material, resulting in age miscalculation.
< Message edited by Zhi -- 8/7/2008 4:11:39 PM >
_____________________________
The optimist says the glass is half full. The pessimist says the glass is half empty. The engineer says the glass is twice as large as it needs to be.
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 4:30:11 PM
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tbull97580
Posts: 16
Joined: 7/16/2008
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Peter_Gunn
I have a question I've always wanted to ask of an "Evolutionary Creationist"...maybe you can answer it.
How do you understand the wording in several verses in Genesis 1..."and God saw that it was good"? And in verse 31, referring to all He had made, God "saw that it was very good."
I've always wondered this...if God is omniscient and if He was pleased with all He had made at the point of Genesis 1:31, why would He have created things just to have them change...or evolve?
Would an omniscient God not create HIS own creation completely, with no need for evolvement or change?
Why would He have to look at it at all? If He is omnipotent wouldn't He already know it was going to be good? Maybe he set up life on earth and the mechanism He used to diversify that life was evolution. And maybe He liked watching His creation of life evolve. However it was done I'm thankful it did happen because I really enjoy being here. 
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 4:38:58 PM
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Zhi
Posts: 1443
Joined: 7/31/2007
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quote:
I have a question you might be able to answer: I read somewhere that radiometric or carbon dating often produces wildly varying conclusions. As a consequence, scientists are forced to make "educated" guesses about which date is correct. I even read a quote from a graduate level text book written by a prominent geologist (don't remember the tile or author) supporting this claim. Is it true that dating techniques typically produce [wildly] varying results?
Well, yes. What you want to conclude from that is also going to wildly vary due to the "why" of that question.
The thing is that the earth is not a closed system, so anything you attempt to measure invariably has the possibility of contamination and variation introduced from a variety of sources (well before you tried to measure it, too). This is kind of an issue when the premise of your measurement is based on a constant rate of decay, with no loss or gain of parent or daughter element during the decay, and the ability to assume the amount of parent and daughter to start with.
So, we start with the source of C14, which is basically a good old carbon atom with a couple of extra neutrons in its nucleus, thus making it radioactive (though not scarily so, so don't worry about it). Basically it forms primarily in our outer atmosphere when Nitrogen atoms get bombarded by cosmic rays. The theory on which C14 dating is based assumes C14 equilibrium (specifically, that the decay rate is equal to the production rate). The problem is that the system is not in equilibrium, nor really can it be, because cosmic ray levels are not in equilibrium either, nor will they ever be, most likely. Additionally, the magnetosphere of the earth varies in strength, also affecting cosmic ray bombardment levels. So, C14 dating has to assume that cosmic ray levels are "more or less" averaging out to be the same, despite any real evidence to that effect.
Now the C14 in the upper atmosphere combines with oxygen (like normal carbon does) and becomes CO2. This filters its way down through the atmosphere where it is "breathed in" by plants, which retain the carbon and expel oxygen. Animals eat the plants, other animals eat the animals, the C14 gets passed around until something dies and gets preserved without getting eaten. How much C14 they get depends on the ratio available at the time. This ratio can be affected by, well, a lot of things. We already discussed the formation fluctuations due to cosmic ray level fluctuations. Further large fluctuations can happen through things like massive extinction events (lots and lots of dead carbon-based stuff rotting releases more C12 into the atmosphere), current fluctuations in the deep ocean (the deep ocean is well-shielded from cosmic radiation and therefore has very low levels of C14), carbonate rock dissolution in the ocean, and the way that the ingestors utilize C14. The last example is why living mollusks can end up carbon-dated as having died 2,000 years ago, a shell from a living snail showed that it was 27,000 years old, and a freshly killed seal in Antarctica was dated at 1,300 years old. The strange dates are to some extent a side-effect of the unusual environment (from a C14 standpoint) in which these creatures lived. But, there are also cases in which animals (often mammoths) are carbon dated and different parts of their bodies are tens of thousands of years older that each other.
So, basically we have to accept the fact that carbon dating can be very severely affected by the environment of the sample during its life, and by the environment preserving the sample after its death.
Edit: Forgot to mention, there have been numerous accounts of dinosaur fossils being carbon dated in the vicinity of 20,000-40,000 years old. Given the expected age of dinosaur bones, there should be basically no C14 left to test, much less any to give a date like that. This leads to three possible conclusions. First possible conclusion is that dinosaurs are a lot more recent than we thought. Second possible conclusion is that post-death carbon contamination is a lot more prevalent than we thought. Third possible conclusion is that multiple separate leading labs are really bad at doing an accurate carbon dating test if they aren't given hints regarding how old their samples are supposed to be. None of these conclusions bode well for carbon dating.
< Message edited by Zhi -- 8/7/2008 4:57:10 PM >
_____________________________
The optimist says the glass is half full. The pessimist says the glass is half empty. The engineer says the glass is twice as large as it needs to be.
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 4:56:58 PM
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mushhead
Posts: 515
Joined: 5/29/2005
From: Kearns
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quote:
quote ORIGINAL: drj11
quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
The scientist's error is not based on God misleading anyone, rather it is based on the scientist trusting his own observations rather than trusting God's word.
Then why are there Christian scientists? They seem to believe both and have no qualms with either. However, they understand scripture in a fundamentally different way than a literalist does.
Yes, but that is not an argument against my statement. Isn't possible that the scientists you speak of have also placed trust in observation, and then attempted to reconcile those conclusions with Scripture? Much like some Christians during the various Roman persecutions of the church, who attempted to reconcile their faith in Jesus with surrendering their copies of the scripture, and/or professing the diety of the Emporer. Evolution cannot be disproven, therefore it is accepted on faith.
My point was that some people choose to put their faith in a theory that is supported by evidence that is so open to interpretation, and subject to so many variables (known and unknown) compromising the integrity of that evidence, it would not be accepted as authoritative in any other field that I can think of. So to answer my own questions: yes, some people choose to first put their faith in a theory, and then interpret scripture accordingly.
quote:
ORIGINAL: drj11
quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
What evidence? Have you heard of the strata and other geological formations that geologists believed required millions and billions of years to form, which formed in a few short months after the Mount St. Helen's eruption? The problem with old earth theories is they are based on an agenda to remove God from any explaination of the univers's existance. The same evidence that is used to support the "old" theory can also be interpreted to explain the "young."
Its really saddening to see this myth (in bold) so prevalent, when it is so obviously false it doesnt hold up to even the slightest scrutiny. When did people become so fearful of science? The fields of science are populated by people of all walks of life, including Christians. Christians who believe in an old earth and even study evolution. Do they have an agenda to remove God from any explanation of the universe? I don't think so. Lets stop spreading this vicious lie.
I didn't say all scientists. It is, however, not a viscious lie or an unsubstantiated rumor. It is an undeniable fact that this is the agenda for many; one which is freely admit.ted All you have to do is read the posts on this very forum to
see that the only possibility they are not willing to entertain is the existance of a God that is responsible for the existance of th universe.
_____________________________
MUSHHEAD
Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces. Matt. 7:6
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 5:11:49 PM
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essentialsaltes
Posts: 1063
Joined: 10/14/2007
From: Inglewood, CA
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Zhi
I think your figure got lost in the copy paste. >.> <.<
The first (Fig. 1) is a clickable link to an article.
quote:
Comparisons of dead trees and attempting to line up the rings in order to try to figure out what goes farther back where, is rather... subjective.
It's not simple, but I would hardly call it subjective. Wetter or drier years leave variations in the width of tree rings. Trees in similar locations experience the same weather, so (roughly speaking) they have the same pattern of widths. A tree 100 years older than another will have its ring pattern 'shifted' 100 rings. If enough points of similarity are discovered, one can be pretty sure of having the correct match to extend the dating.
quote:
quote:
But more importantly, radiocarbon dating appears to be roughly 'linear' in the sense you mean for the past 40,000 years (just about the entire span of time for which it is used). It may be off by 10% or even 20% for all I know, but clearly not the 700% that would be required to squeeze the time frame down to 6000 years.
Well, of course it "appears" to be roughly linear... because the assumptions regarding it assume that it is linear.
No such assumption is made. If, more or less, one year gives you one tree ring, then this gives you a method of dating. Radiometric methods give you another method of dating. When you plot them against each other, the relationship is roughly linear, showing that these clocks are running at close to the same rate over the span of thousands of years. If the radiometric dating method were nonlinear then the graph would not be linear. If, say, radiocarbon decayed 50% faster in the 30th century BC, then to keep the graph linear, somehow trees would have to leave behind 1.5 treerings per year during that entire century.
quote:
The problem with zircon dating is that zircons are resistant to thermal changes and tend to be more difficult to, well, melt, than the other rocks with them. So, detrital zircons can just as easily come from sedimentary recycling as from formation in the current strata.
That may present difficulties for dating the particular sedimentary rock in which the zircon was found, but it does not affect the age of the zircon itself. Assuming the zircons didn't predate the earth, the earth has to be older than the zircons, and the zircons are billions of years old.
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Zircon is not resistant thermally in one sense, though, specifically that heating can cause the lead to diffuse out of the crystal, thereby changing the ratio of lead to uranium.
If that happens, then the two measurements will not be on the concordia line, unless a statistical miracle occurs. If this miracle occurs, the removal of the daughter product (lead) would make the zircon appear younger than it is. Even if that makes that particular zircon's age unreliable, it sets a minimum age, again in the billions of years.
quote:
Furthermore, zircon is difficult to analyze as the formations tend to be very, very tiny, and it can be difficult to distinguish overgrowth from core material, resulting in age miscalculation.
I'm sure there are many difficulties in performing these analyses. A laser abalation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometer is even harder to operate than it is to pronounce. But to dismiss every zircon analysis as erroneous is pretty extreme, particularly since you seem to accept the validity of the basic method.
_____________________________
"My object in all arguments is not to make any preconceived opinion of mine seem right, but merely to discover and establish the truth, whatever the truth may be."
-- HP Lovecraft, letter to Robert E. Howard 7/27-28/34
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 5:14:27 PM
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essentialsaltes
Posts: 1063
Joined: 10/14/2007
From: Inglewood, CA
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
All you have to do is read the posts on this very forum to
see that the only possibility they are not willing to entertain is the existance of a God that is responsible for the existance of th universe.
Could you give some examples of this from this very forum?
_____________________________
"My object in all arguments is not to make any preconceived opinion of mine seem right, but merely to discover and establish the truth, whatever the truth may be."
-- HP Lovecraft, letter to Robert E. Howard 7/27-28/34
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 5:17:37 PM
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drmark
Posts: 3149
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What does the word "atheist" mean to you, es? Do you deny the self-acclaimed beliefs of many posting on these S&O forums?
_____________________________
Jeremiah 31:31-34. The time is NOW, fellow saints!
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 5:34:24 PM
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drj11
Posts: 632
Joined: 3/29/2008
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quote:
ORIGINAL: mushhead
Yes, but that is not an argument against my statement. Isn't possible that the scientists you speak of have also placed trust in observation, and then attempted to reconcile those conclusions with Scripture?
Given that one can only interpret gods word by observing it, I should hope we could trust observation. Trusting observation (with recognition of its limitations) is vital to the concept that we can actually know and understand anything at all. You can't read the Bible without observing it.
And given that many creationists, especially around here, proclaim the Bible's truth is evidence by observations (fulfilled prophecies etc) creationists seem to place their trust in it as well. It is inescapable.
That genesis is a literal or historical account of the creation of the universe has by no means enjoyed any kind of overwhelming consensus in Christianity or Judaism even since the time Christ walked the earth. So even if we didnt have 'science' as we know it today, chances are people would still be having similar arguments (and they did).
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Much like some Christians during the various Roman persecutions of the church, who attempted to reconcile their faith in Jesus with surrendering their copies of the scripture, and/or professing the diety of the Emporer. Evolution cannot be disproven, therefore it is accepted on faith.
See this comparison bothers me on a number of levels. Creationism vs evolution isnt even loosely analagous to the Roman persecution of Christians, (even if that might not be the thrust of your point). The imagery there really bothers me (ie evolutions persecuting Christians, just like the Romans?). Furthermore, I think you fundamentally misunderstand the position of most 'theistic evolutionists' if you claim they are like Romans giving up their Bibles... selling out so to speak.
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My point was that some people choose to put their faith in a theory that is supported by evidence that is so open to interpretation, and subject to so many variables (known and unknown) compromising the integrity of that evidence, it would not be accepted as authoritative in any other field that I can think of.
I think you underestimate the sheer amounts of study and information we do have regarding evolution. To beat a dead horse, it is one of the most well supported scientific theories of our time.. what it most definitely inst is faith.
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So to answer my own questions: yes, some people choose to first put their faith in a theory, and then interpret scripture accordingly.
Some people believe creation itself is the 'Word of God' along with scripture... so understanding and listening to what his creation says is in fact putting their faith in the 'Word of God'. There is biblical support for this concept. When you make statements like that you insult the intellect of many theist/religious scientists who have very good and very well reasoned notions about the reconciliation of science and religion. Some would say there really isnt much reconciliation to be done, honestly.
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I didn't say all scientists. It is, however, not a viscious lie or an unsubstantiated rumor. It is an undeniable fact that this is the agenda for many; one which is freely admitted
I don't see it that way. Some scientists are atheists, and try to marginalize religion sure. Some are also overtly religious, and promote their own religion. It is a rumor, (mostly creationist alarmist rhetoric) that there is an organized concerted effort on the part of the 'scientific establishment' to deny God, and thats what it sounded like to me your original statement was alluding too.
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All you have to do is read the posts on this very forum to see that the only possibility they are not willing to entertain is the existance of a God that is responsible for the existance of th universe.
If God does exist, I would say there is but one thing about him for which we can be absolutely certain.... he is a great scientist.
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 5:56:30 PM
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essentialsaltes
Posts: 1063
Joined: 10/14/2007
From: Inglewood, CA
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: drmark
What does the word "atheist" mean to you, es? Do you deny the self-acclaimed beliefs of many posting on these S&O forums?
If this is in reference to my question above, concerning whether atheists "are not willing to entertain is the existance of a God that is responsible for the existance of th universe," it's because I have entertained the existence of gods in many threads here, at the very least for the sake of argument and discussion. And when I do entertain the idea, some people get all cranky about it and call it "deception", "insincere", "specious" and "suspect". Now from the other side, I'm told that not to entertain the idea of gods is evidence of the secret agenda of the great scientific atheistic conspiracy.
I can't win when both options are wrong, but I at least want to establish that the way I'm losing is by entertaining the existence of gods.
To answer your question directly:
An atheist does not believe in the existence of any gods.
This does not preclude the possibility of discussing the existence of gods for the sake of argument. Similarly, I can say "If Santa Claus exists, his sleigh must fly very rapidly to visit every child on earth in one night" without denying or betraying my a-Santa-ism.
Just to communicate effectively with the Christians here, I think most of the atheists here adopt a position that amounts to entertaining the idea of gods. When someone says, "God created the nose so that there would be someplace to put our eyeglasses," the atheists do not respond by saying, "There are no gods, therefore you are automatically wrong. QED." Here on your 'home turf', we engage you in discussion without requiring you to entertain atheism.
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"My object in all arguments is not to make any preconceived opinion of mine seem right, but merely to discover and establish the truth, whatever the truth may be."
-- HP Lovecraft, letter to Robert E. Howard 7/27-28/34
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:05:29 PM
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Consecrated2God
Posts: 4984
Joined: 4/4/2005
From: Formerly Jesus Land
Status: online
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ATTENTION: Moderator's Note
This thread is going off-topic. To refresh your memory, the topic is as follows:
quote:
Where do you stand on the age of the Earth?
The 6000 year old doctrine or something else?
Why?
If your posts do not address the age of the earth, they will be considered off-topic.
Please do not reply to this message within the Community.
Please email Community@salemwebnetwork.com with questions, comments, or concerns.
Please do not send me PMs regarding this message.
Thank you for your attention and complicance in this matter.
Lisa Luper
Faith Community Network
Forums Moderator
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<--Plantation house in Louisiana
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:07:36 PM
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Zhi
Posts: 1443
Joined: 7/31/2007
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We don't really have that many trees to compare. Those that we do have don't really tend to be in the same area.
Are you familiar with the study by D. K. Yamaguchi, in which he took a 290-ring douglas fir and cross-matched it with the master growth ring sequence for Pacific Northwest Douglas Firs? He got 99.9% correlation with 113 different matches. Time to start guessing I suppose. Yes, I'm aware that the C14 carbon dating can also be used to attempt correlation, but then you have a circular proof (the carbon dating is right because the rings are right because the carbon dating is right because the rings are right because...)
Furthermore, the "one ring a year" is questionable. It has been demonstrated repeatedly by botanists that a drought followed by renewed rain can result in 2 rings in a single year. The Carribean pine, for instance, generally creates 4 to 5 rings every year due to repeated wet spells. Furthermore, extreme stress (extreme cold or drought, getting hit by lightning, insect problems, fire) can cause a tree to not produce a ring in a year.
On zircon validity: I have no comment on the basic validity of zircon measurement because frankly it misses the point (and because the helium content discussion will get really, really complicated). Because the young-earth theory indicates that rocks were basically formed instantaneously in their current state in place and/or put rapidly into place by divine intervention in order to get both the entire planet and a full plant-life coverage in a single 24-hour period, it simply does not matter to a young-earther what the element levels are in a zircon, because the zircon was formed instantaneously with those levels, minus about 6,000 years.
_____________________________
The optimist says the glass is half full. The pessimist says the glass is half empty. The engineer says the glass is twice as large as it needs to be.
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:29:49 PM
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mushhead
Posts: 515
Joined: 5/29/2005
From: Kearns
Status: offline
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quote:
Given that one can only interpret gods word by observing it, I should hope we could trust observation. Trusting observation (with recognition of its limitations) is vital to the concept that we can actually know and understand anything at all. You can't read the Bible without observing it.
Observation can be misleading (see my first post).
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And given that many creationists, especially around here, proclaim the Bible's truth is evidence by observations (fulfilled prophecies etc) creationists seem to place their trust in it as well. It is inescapable.
Yes, the Biblical account is accepted on faith.
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That genesis is a literal or historical account of the creation of the universe has by no means enjoyed any kind of overwhelming consensus in Christianity or Judaism even since the time Christ walked the earth. So even if we didnt have 'science' as we know it today, chances are people would still be having similar arguments (and they did).
It is not difficult to look back through the ages and find people who said and believed all kinds of stuff. IOW's just because you can find groups of Christians that didn't believe in the resurrection does not mean that it didn't happen.
The authority for our faith is God, His word, and ultimately Jesus. While some Christians might not interpret Genesis literally, Jesus did. Because He was there at the beginning, I think we can trust His position more so than we can trust the opinions of men.
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See this comparison bothers me on a number of levels. Creationism vs evolution isnt even loosely analagous to the Roman persecution of Christians, (even if that might not be the thrust of your point). The imagery there really bothers me (ie evolutions persecuting Christians, just like the Romans?). Furthermore, I think you fundamentally misunderstand the position of most 'theistic evolutionists' if you claim they are like Romans giving up their Bibles... selling out so to speak.
No, but the fact that Christians during the time of Roman persecution reacted to the events of their day and then looked for justification in the Scripture is analogous to theistic evolutionists who choose to react to the events of today (scientific communities belief in evolution) by looking to fit that view into the scripture. You might not be aware of this, entire strains of Christianity were given birth for the specific reason of responding to developments in such fields as science and literary criticism. Their stated mission, to reconcile Scripture to these modern developments. Theistic evolutionists are direct descendents of these groups.
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I think you underestimate the sheer amounts of study and information we do have regarding evolution. To beat a dead horse, it is one of the most well supported scientific theories of our time.. what it most definitely inst is faith.
Yet every time I get into, or listen to a debate with evolutionists, this so called evidence seems to become inexplicably unavailable.
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Some people believe creation itself is the 'Word of God' along with scripture... so understanding and listening to what his creation says is in fact putting their faith in the 'Word of God'. There is biblical support for this concept. When you make statements like that you insult the intellect of many theist/religious scientists who have very good and very well reasoned notions about the reconciliation of science and religion. Some would say there really isnt much reconciliation to be done, honestly.
The word of God is a higher form of revelation than is the physical world. I agree that God is revealed in creation, but that revelation is limited. Scripture is much more specific. The Bible is not a book of science, but one thing I am sure of, nothing in Scripture will ever contradict what God reveals about Himself in nature.
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I don't see it that way. Some scientists are atheists, and try to marginalize religion sure. Some are also overtly religious, and promote their own religion. It is a rumor, (mostly creationist alarmist rhetoric) that there is an organized concerted effort on the part of the 'scientific establishment' to deny God, and thats what it sounded like to me your original statement was alluding too.
That's just naive. There are back door ways to carry out this agenda. Remember, Dr. Stephen Gould, the prominent paleonthologist at Harvard, who was instrumental in proposing "punctuated equilibrium" as an alternative to Darwinian evolutionary theory. Dr. Gould was honest enough to admit that the evidence for Darwin's theory just didn't exist, so he proposed what, to him, was a logical alternative that explained the evidence. As a result he was subject to extraordinary, and oft times personal, assaults on from prominent members of the scientific community for divirging from the accepted "party line." And he was one of America's most respected evolutionists.
The following is just an excerpt of a New York Times review of Daniel Dennett's book "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" in which John Maynard Smith both demonstrates the anymosity toward Gould, and that you are wrong about the motives of many evolutionists:
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"Because of the excellence of his essays, [Gould] has come to be seen by non-biologists as the preeminent evolutionary theorist. In contrast, the evolutionary biologists with whom I have discussed his work tend to see him as a man whose ideas are so confused as to be hardly worth bothering with, but as one who should not be publicly criticized because he is at least on our side against the creationists."
Remember that Gould was one of the most respected, and published, evolutionary scientists of our time. Don't tell me that their is no effort to silence alternatives to Darwin (God is one such alternative). It is the accepted party line, and anyone that says otherwise risks losing career and reputation.
These are the reasons why I believe that the earth is young, though I don't pretend to know how young. This is also why I disagree with the reasons given in support of an old earth - they are the result of the scientific community's version of political correctness.
< Message edited by mushhead -- 8/7/2008 6:47:38 PM >
_____________________________
MUSHHEAD
Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces. Matt. 7:6
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:46:05 PM
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essentialsaltes
Posts: 1063
Joined: 10/14/2007
From: Inglewood, CA
Status: online
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Zhi
Are you familiar with the study by D. K. Yamaguchi
I am now. Here it is (PDF).
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in which he took a 290-ring douglas fir and cross-matched it with the master growth ring sequence for Pacific Northwest Douglas Firs? He got 99.9% correlation with 113 different matches. Time to start guessing I suppose.
No, we can do better than guess. As Yamaguchi clearly knew, since he was pointing out one solution to reconcile the problem of cross-correlation artifacts. When he used ARIMA models to improve the matching, "A single bark date - AD 1647 - was found to have a t value significant at the 0.001 level." No need for guessing when you have 1 possibility.
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Furthermore, the "one ring a year" is questionable. It has been demonstrated repeatedly by botanists that a drought followed by renewed rain can result in 2 rings in a single year. The Carribean pine, for instance, generally creates 4 to 5 rings every year due to repeated wet spells. Furthermore, extreme stress (extreme cold or drought, getting hit by lightning, insect problems, fire) can cause a tree to not produce a ring in a year.
Agreed, but in the main, one ring a year is close enough for error of a few percent for many trees.
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it simply does not matter to a young-earther what the element levels are in a zircon, because the zircon was formed instantaneously with those levels, minus about 6,000 years.
Agreed, but the deeper strata have a different isotopic ratio than shallower strata, and this top to bottom gradation shows a consistent gradient in isotopic ratio. An omnipotent creator can do as he/she likes, of course, but this hypothetical YE creationist has to accept this 'pseudo-appearance' of age as either a grand coincidence or a deliberate design element.
_____________________________
"My object in all arguments is not to make any preconceived opinion of mine seem right, but merely to discover and establish the truth, whatever the truth may be."
-- HP Lovecraft, letter to Robert E. Howard 7/27-28/34
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:53:33 PM
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mushhead
Posts: 515
Joined: 5/29/2005
From: Kearns
Status: offline
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quote:
Agreed, but the deeper strata have a different isotopic ratio than shallower strata, and this top to bottom gradation shows a consistent gradient in isotopic ratio. An omnipotent creator can do as he/she likes, of course, but this hypothetical YE creationist has to accept this 'pseudo-appearance' of age as either a grand coincidence or a deliberate design element.
I know Zhi will have a better response, but I thought I'd throw in my two cents worth. While this is partially true, we YE'ers do not just ignore science. We realize that deeper stata does not always prove to be older. We also realize that other explanations exist for the dating results. And finally, we have the (dare I refer to it again) Mount St. Helen's event, after which strata was developed in a short period of time, thus exploding the Old Earth models. Likewise, the new rock formations at St. Helen's dated much older than we know for certain they are - again exploding the OE models.
_____________________________
MUSHHEAD
Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces. Matt. 7:6
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RE: "Young Earth" doctrine????? - 8/7/2008 6:55:50 PM
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gluadys
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