1. Welcome to Baptist Board, a friendly forum to discuss the Baptist Faith in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to all the features that our community has to offer.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon and God Bless!

Populating the Americas

Discussion in 'Science' started by Alcott, Nov 25, 2004.

  1. Alcott

    Alcott Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Dec 17, 2002
    Messages:
    9,404
    Likes Received:
    353
    Faith:
    Baptist
    I assume this subject belongs in the Science forum rather than History, because ascertaining the facts and developing hypotheses are based on geological and archaelogical finds, rather than on written or etched records.

    Anyway, the populating of the Americas presents a problem for Biblical literalism. If the flood of Noah (supposing it is a literal event) took place approximately 2359 b.c., then obviously the ancestors of native Americans did not arrive before then. Yet there have been finds of human bones along with spearheads and bones which do not fit any creature existing now, such as mammoths, and other animals not known to exist in the Americas until imported by Europeans or others, such as camels and horses. Dating methods for many of these finds indicate human activity as far back as 11,500 b.c. Some recent finds indicate even further back in time and these may not have been ancestors of the 'Native Americans' we know; but that is not the focus of this topic.

    So how and when natives-- or other peoples before the 'natives'-- got here and dispersed all over 2 continents is clearly at odds with a literal reading of the Noahic flood, and so is the existence of of many animals and their remains in America, since Noah got "every" kind of animal. If there is not evolution, then mammoths and mastodons, as well as Indian and Asian elephants, for an example, must have been on the ark, and they somehow got to America. And unless the Bering 'land bridge' was not submerged, as it is now, any animals going to or from America would have had to swim or fly. But even if Asia and America were connected, that doesn't explain the different mammals in Australia and how they all must have swum there. If you say the mammoths, saber-toothed cats, et al, lived in America before the flood, then where did they go afterword? [Noah failed in the plan if he didn't keep them alive to multiply again.] Their fossilized remains do not indicate life in Eurasia any more recently than in the Americas.

    Finally, what are some of our attitudes about opposition to research about these subjects? Christians opposed research by Galileo and burned Bruno and others at the stake for speculating on things they had already made their minds up about. Today, Indian groups have successfully stopped research, for instance, on the "Kennewick man," a skeletal remain found in Washington believed to be about 9000 years old with features closer to Europeans than to Indian people. A tribe claimed the remains to 'rebury' according to federal laws regading indigenous people and control over such remains. Research might give clues about other migrations to America of other people-- something the Indians do not want, or else they may lose their claim to being the first Americans. And almost all Indian tribes have their own "creation" stories about coming up from below the earth, or down from the sky, to inhabit "their own" land. Thus many reject even any relation to other Mongoloid people with whom they share facial features. Can Christians see some of our past, or even present, attitudes in such opposition to tradition and lore?
     
  2. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    If the ancestors of native Americans arrived prior to 2359 BC, then obviously the ww flood occurred long before 2359 BC and the scattering of the nations.
     
  3. Gina B

    Gina B Active Member

    Joined:
    Dec 30, 2000
    Messages:
    16,944
    Likes Received:
    1
    Why wouldn't they have arrived before then? Haven't different races existed always?
    Gina
     
  4. RTG

    RTG New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 5, 2004
    Messages:
    111
    Likes Received:
    0
    Have you done research on dating methods?Are they always accurate?11,500 years ago?Are these theorys?
     
  5. Dr. Bob

    Dr. Bob Administrator
    Administrator

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2000
    Messages:
    30,285
    Likes Received:
    507
    Faith:
    Baptist
    You cannot depend on "scientific" dating, since it is biased to "prove" evolutionary hypothesis.

    Historical records of HUMANITY in the Americas shows migration from North to South (land/ice bridge in Alaska) in the 4000-2000 BCE era. These dates are within general consensus of a flood.

    Henry Morris (science prof at Univ. of Minnesota back in MY day and prolific anti-evolution writer) wrote "Biblical Cosmology", a worthwhile paperback. It shows the mathematics of population.

    If there WASN'T a world-wide Flood in the past 6000 years, our planet would be overun with tens of billions of people.

    Our population chart (how we got to 6 billion today) demands a "0" back around 4000-3500 BCE.
     
  6. UTEOTW

    UTEOTW New Member

    Joined:
    May 8, 2002
    Messages:
    4,087
    Likes Received:
    0
    "Have you done research on dating methods?Are they always accurate?11,500 years ago?Are these theorys? "

    C14 dating has been calibrated back far more than 11,500 years and is found to be quite accurate in that time.

    This is a useful link for learning more.

    http://www.c14dating.com/

    "You cannot depend on "scientific" dating, since it is biased to "prove" evolutionary hypothesis."

    No. See above for a good link on C14.

    The geologic formulation of an old earth is separate from biology. Astronomy is again different from both.

    "If there WASN'T a world-wide Flood in the past 6000 years, our planet would be overun with tens of billions of people.

    Our population chart (how we got to 6 billion today) demands a "0" back around 4000-3500 BCE.
    "

    No, not really. Such calculations are very sensitive to the parameters used. The normal way to show the foolishness of such calculations is to use something like rabbits or bacteria and show that with similar assumptions how quickly every square foot of the earth would be covered.

    No, populations of anything are usually somewhat stable with time. Humans should be no different.

    Another good response to this involves taking the calculations and showing how few people would have then been alive at certain points in history. For instance "the Pyramids of Giza were constructed before 2490 BC, even before the proposed Flood date. Even if we assume they were built 100 years after the flood, then the world population for their construction was 13 people. In 1446 BC, when Moses was said to be leading 600,000 men (plus women and children) on the Exodus, this model of population growth gives 726 people in the world. In 481 BC, Xerxes gathered an army of 2,641,000 (according to Herodotus) when the world population, according to the model, was 89,425. Even allowing for exaggerated numbers, the population model makes no sense."
    Link
     
  7. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    The New World didn't exist before the flood. it was uplifted during the year of the flood.

    Besides, "all flesh in which is the breath of life" was wiped out except those on board the ark.
     
  8. Gina B

    Gina B Active Member

    Joined:
    Dec 30, 2000
    Messages:
    16,944
    Likes Received:
    1
    Ok, thanks. I'd never thought of that or known it was part of the argument, simply assumed that God populated the whole world and America was part of it!
    Gina
     
  9. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    UTEOTW posted November 25, 2004 06:52 PM
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    "C14 dating has been calibrated back far more than 11,500 years and is found to be quite accurate in that time."

    Too bad for your calibrations that no one was alive on earth far more than 11,500 years to verify the accuracy of your claim.

    "Such calculations are very sensitive to the parameters used."

    Seems like some calculations are more sensitive to the parameters used than other calculations.

    "The normal way to show the foolishness of such calculations is to use something like rabbits or bacteria and show that with similar assumptions how quickly every square foot of the earth would be covered."

    The normal way to show the foolishness of radioisotopic calculations is to point out that no one who lived beyond 10 millenia ago was around to verify them.

    "For instance "the Pyramids of Giza were constructed before 2490 BC, even before the proposed Flood date."

    With this sort of info and data it is no wonder that you are mentally confabulated about the chronology of historical Biblical records. The flood occurred at least 1500 years before the Tower of Babel was even built 6000 years ago.

    "Even if we assume they were built 100 years after the flood, then the world population for their construction was 13 people."

    Why "assume" such silly notions when we can know for sure that the population on earth at the time of the Tower of Babel was in the millions.

    "In 1446 BC, when Moses was said to be leading 600,000 men (plus women and children) on the Exodus, this model of population growth gives 726 people in the world."

    Correction: This model of population growth gives 726 descendents of Jacob in Egypt soon after his children's arrival.

    "Even allowing for exaggerated numbers, the population model makes no sense."

    Yours certainly doesn't!
     
  10. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    Well, They didn't call America the New World for nothing. Anyway, it's just a humble hypothesis but you are indeed welcome to use it any time someone starts spouting off about carbon or other radioisotopic dating techiques.
     
  11. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

    Joined:
    Aug 18, 2001
    Messages:
    9,687
    Likes Received:
    1
    Well, you know how you can't take it literally. It didn't really mean the whole world.

    Flood is like that, too. ;)
     
  12. Alcott

    Alcott Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Dec 17, 2002
    Messages:
    9,404
    Likes Received:
    353
    Faith:
    Baptist
    "If the ancestors of native Americans arrived prior to 2359 BC, then obviously the ww flood occurred long before 2359 BC and the scattering of the nations."

    "The flood occurred at least 1500 years before the Tower of Babel was even built 6000 years ago."

    Where do you get your numbers from? 2359 b.c. I got from chronology in a Bible I have. However, you can take Genesis 1-11 and add the years up for yourself that the flood was 1656 years after the creation of Adam, and then Abraham was born by the 1958th year. The arithmetic gets more tedious after this, but you can take Matthew 1:17 and see that there 42 generations from Abraham to Jesus. Then, considering the patriarchs still had very long lifespans, the flood date as 302 years before Abraham still yields less than an average age of 50 for the 'begetting' of each father in Jesus' line. So 2359 b.c. is certainly close to the biblical time of the flood-- meaning your date for the Tower of Babel as 6000 years ago is way off.

    "Why wouldn't they have arrived before then? Haven't different races existed always?"
    (Gina)


    "Always?" Were Adam and Eve themselves different races? Did they give birth to different-raced children? There is no logical or Biblical way to claim that. The evolutionists' explanation would be that different groups of people developed different unique characteristics which give them advantages in the environments in which they settled for generations. I really don't think that contradicts the Bible.

    "The New World didn't exist before the flood. it was uplifted during the year of the flood."

    I don't know where you get this idea. Is it just a supposition? But did the animals in the Americas swim here or fly here, and how? And having dated the flood as with 2 to 3 centuries of 2359 b.c., is that enough time for such complete forestation?

    "Besides, "all flesh in which is the breath of life" was wiped out except those on board the ark."

    This is not a quote from scripture that I am aware of. But aquatic mammals-- seals, dolphins, whales of all kind-- breathe air. Were they on the ark? Could a 450 foot vessel hold 2 of every species of whale with hundreds of thousands of other species? That's quite preposterous. BTW, even fish have the 'breath of life'-- they intake oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide.
     
  13. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    Hi Alcott: I don't want to get into a tit for tat here so suffice it to say that I subscribe to the theories which Morris and Whitcomb advocate in their book 'Genesis Flood.' They allow for a little more liberal dating of Babel and the flood.

    My rational for dating the flood around 6000BC is justified by theistic evolutionists squeezing billions of year out of 6 days. In addition to that, I basically believe that everything that is capable of being known must first be capable of being believed.

    As Descates based his famous maxim on the fact that while it is possible to doubt everything, one may not doubt that one doubts, therefore, one may believe in oneself.

    BTW: Are you a complete Biblical literalist?
     
  14. Alcott

    Alcott Well-Known Member
    Site Supporter

    Joined:
    Dec 17, 2002
    Messages:
    9,404
    Likes Received:
    353
    Faith:
    Baptist
    No, I would not describe myself as a "complete Biblical literalist," and I don't think anyone is. Everyone, among those who regard the Bible as truth at all, acknowledge that not everything is meant to be taken as literal. The question I normally ask anyone who claims they are an "absolute literalist" is: Do you believe "our God is a consuming fire" and that we are to "draw near to God"?... that we are to literally to come nearer to a consuming fire?
     
  15. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    A consuming fire is predicted for the end of the world and for all who reject God's Word, so if we are all going to eventually be eternally consumed by fire I guess it's only a matter of choice which consuming fire we shall be drawn "nearer" to.
     
  16. Paul of Eugene

    Paul of Eugene New Member

    Joined:
    Oct 30, 2001
    Messages:
    2,782
    Likes Received:
    0
    Everybody knows that trees grow an annual ring. Rings on trees have been counted back, and, comparing patterns of dry years/ wet years in the rings to line up between older and younger trees, we have reliable tree ring datings going back to the end of the last ice age, 10-12000 years ago. The carbon dating works just fine for all those years. In addition, some lakes have annual silt deposits (the annual layers can be determined by the blooming of life in the lake every spring that filters down) and these go back 30 thousand years or more. Carbon dating of these correlates perfectly with the tree ring dating and the lake layer dating. In addition, it is possible to obtain annual layer counts of snow laid down in Antarctica and Greenland, they have layers going down for more than 200,000 years (summer and winter have different crystal sizes) and the carbon 14 dating from those layers is also consistent as long as it still works - it peters out as a dating method at about 50,000 years.

    And of course, since a flood would have absolutely destroyed the ice layers of Antarctica and Greenland, it is proven that no world wide flood occurred since those 200,000 + annual layers started to form . . .
     
  17. jcrawford

    jcrawford New Member

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2004
    Messages:
    708
    Likes Received:
    0
    Paul of Eugene posted November 27, 2004 11:39 PM
    -------------------------------------------------

    "Everybody knows that trees grow an annual ring. Rings on trees have been counted back, and, comparing patterns of dry years/ wet years in the rings to line up between older and younger trees, we have reliable tree ring datings going back to the end of the last ice age, 10-12000 years ago.

    And of course, since a flood would have absolutely destroyed the ice layers of Antarctica and Greenland, it is proven that no world wide flood occurred since those 200,000 + annual layers started to form . . . "

    Where do you think all the ice came from if not from the receding remnants of some great flood waters some 10-12000 years ago?

    Get real, will you, or at least get logical and reasonable.
     
  18. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

    Joined:
    Aug 18, 2001
    Messages:
    9,687
    Likes Received:
    1
    The ice in ice caps is from compacted snowfall. We can watch it form, so we know that's right. And because it is seasonal, it layers nicely, giving a very good way of checking some important scientific questions.

    Moving water doesn't freeze, and it doesn't run uphill, either.
     
  19. Paul of Eugene

    Paul of Eugene New Member

    Joined:
    Oct 30, 2001
    Messages:
    2,782
    Likes Received:
    0
    Actually, about 10-12000 years ago the ice age was ending and this caused lots of floods. Noah was the victim of a flood that destroyed all the known world, known to him. There is lots of linguistic precedence to call something "the world" when what is meant literally would be "the world of men" or "all the area inhabited" . . .
     
  20. Johnv

    Johnv New Member

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2001
    Messages:
    21,321
    Likes Received:
    0
    This is not an evolution issue topic whatsoever. This is the topic of North American native population. We certainly don't have a problem accepting dating methods when they refute things like the Shroud of Turin, etc.

    However, the timeline of NA is irrelevant to the point of the Noah account that God inspired the author to write. We need not stress over these things.
     
Loading...