Questions to YEC's

LATE CRETACEOUS
I have asked this question on several forums, and have NEVER EVER received a reply.

Why do you think evolutionary theory disputes the existance of God?

and

Why is it that so many other religious people of all christian faiths accept the reality of the mountain of evidence that supports the theory of evolution? Heck, the catholic church even endorses evolution.

If you insist on a literal interpretation of the bible, then do you think the earth is immobile and rests on pillars, or that the firmament is a solid thing which has doors/windows through which flood waters pass. Now, I am sure that many will say "well obviously THOSE things are not ment to be taken literally..." But before science demonstrated that these were not the case, they would have been accepted.


JOHN WELLS
You are wrong about them ever being accepted literally. Ever heard of a metaphor? The Bible uses them, parables, and allegories. However, it is quite clear when in those modes so that one does not have to guess. Your question does not lend itself to a short answer, but I'll try to summarize.

Not only does the Genesis account of creation explicitly state that God created all that there is out of nothing in six literal days, but we find references to various parts of it (also statements of a factual nature) sprinkled throughout the Bible. For instance, Jesus himself stated in Mark 10:6 "from the beginning of creation God made them male and female." Now "The Barbarian" and others have put all sorts of ridiculous spins on what that says, but to many of us there aren't a wide range of possibilities for what Jesus meant. He refers to "the beginning" as the creation week, which began with "In the beginning . . ."

So when one says that Genesis 1 is not true, the implication is that they've shredded the entire Bible of any reliability.

Last point (for now): If Adam is a fictional character, then Jesus is too, because of the link between "the first Adam," original sin, and "the second Adam," atonement for that sin. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. (1 Cor 15:22 NIV)
This is not an allegory, parable, or metaphor. In the context given, it is dealing with absolutes.


JOE MEERT
I am not sure I can agree with your assertions about the bible. the notion that the days are literal 24 hour days does not fit with the order of events in Genesis nor is the day ever defined. The definition of a 24 hour day is based on the amount of time it takes for the earth to make one revolution on its axis. Does the bible define this as a day, there are many instances where the bible seems to indicate a fixed earth? Please quote the relevant verses. If you define a day based on the time from sunrise to sunrise, this will also be a variable amount of time and is not equal to 24 hours (except in a few rare cases). So, how is a day defined as 24 hours in the bible?
Secondly, the idea that Adam is not an individual has no bearing on the importance of Jesus. Adam could represent mankind and mankinds fall from grace. Adam could be taken as figurative for mankind and the need for salvation is still very real. This forceful literalism and insistence that the Bible contains a single truth is simply not born out by your examples.


JOHN WELLS
Were the days of Creation Week of 24 hours duration or were they long periods of time? This article will discuss the Hebrew 'time' words which the author had available to him and what meaning he intended to convey by his choice of the specific words he used [1].

MEANING OF YOM
When Moses, under the inspiration of God, compiled the account of creation in Genesis 1, he used the Hebrew word yom for 'day'. He combined yom with numbers ('first day', 'second day', 'third day', etc.) and with the words 'evening and morning', and the first time he employed it he carefully defined the meaning of yom (used in this way) as being one night/day cycle (Genesis 1:5). Thereafter, throughout the Bible, yom used in this way always refers to a normal 24-hour day [2], [3]. There is thus a prima facie case that, when God used the word yom in this way, He intended to convey that the days of creation were 24 hours long.

[Administrator: the entire article was originally entered as text on this post, but edited for the archives to the above paragraph. It may be accessed in full here: ]http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/220.asp]


BARNABAS
Originally posted by Joe Meert: I am not sure I can agree with your assertions about the Bible. The notion that the days are literal 24 hour days does not fit with the order of events in Genesis nor is the day ever defined.

Forgive me for disagreeing on that issue with you Joe. BTW, I enjoyed reading your post. It made me laugh, you made my day.

On the other hand you must have realized by now that this is a Baptist board, and the majoity of our members (yours truly included) believe in the Bible. So if you come from a different perspective and question the validity of God's holy writs, then we have no common ground to discuss anything. You either believe what the Bible says or you don't. You either embrace the truth it contains or ridicule the same. At any rate, the Bible says in Amos 3:3 Can two walk together, except they be agreed? So, are you on a different path?


JOE MEERT
No problem. I am glad that you are able to laugh. The point I am trying to make is that the bible is not specific about the length of time that constitutes a day. You, like some other Baptists have INTERPRETED a day to mean 24 hours. A number of other Baptists and christians INTERPRET these words differently. I have no problem with your assertion that YOU think they are 24 hours, but the bible never really defines it this way. The bible DOES clearly suggest the notion that the earth is the center of the Universe and that the sun revolves around the earth. Once again, in order to make the Bible fit the facts, Baptists are forced to INTERPRET the words of the bible. I guess this is bound to happen when you force a book about salvation to be a book about science.

For Wells:
Evening and morning without a sun and moon? I understand all the different words for day etc and I understand your insistence that a day is 24 hours, but the bible never explicitly says so. I suspect this is why many christians disagree with your assertion. I know you think you hold the correct intepretation, but so do others. Why should I believe you above the others especially when the other interpretations are corroborated by the physical evidence?


JIMMY HIGGINS
How did evening come if there was no sun? How do you know that it was a 24 hour cycle for Day 1? The earth was a formless mass, with not even a sky. Was it orbiting? Was a formless mass rotating for no reason? The solar system was yet to be created!


GARPIER
I find it quite enlightening that some will question a YEC's right to INTERPRET the Bible and then will turn around and give us their interpretation. I find it hard to believe that when the Bible says the evening and the morning were the first day etc that we are accuse of implying something other than a straight forward meaning. The evening and the morning- what else could it imply but a day?


JOE MEERT
That's not what i said! I merely said that if the bible is to be interpreted, then there are a number of ways to interpret it. one way is to insist that day means 24 hours. Other Christians interpret it differently. What I am trying to understand is why there is so little agreement? Seems that if the evidence suggests it was not 24 hours, why force it to be 24 hours?


JOHN WELLS
Also frustrating is the fact that there is a lot of interpreting of scientific evidence going on and everyone's interpretation is, of course, right.
Regarding a day before the sun was created, if you'll read in Rev 21, the "new heaven and earth" will have no need for a sun.
The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. (Rev 21:23 NIV)

In the end will be like "In the beginning . . ."


BARNABAS
Please allow me to interject something before I’ll comment on anything else: I trust you realize that I was not laughing at you, but in the light of the Scriptures I have found your writing pretty amusing.
BTW, (to use your own words) where does the Bible suggest the notion that the earth is the center of the universe and that the sun revolves around the earth?

On another front, it seems that contemporary scientists badgering the Bible for it’s outdated writings, and lack of information – when the truth to the matter is that the Bible contains a wealth of information. Science never refuted the Bible but the reverse is true. While I cannot speak for the Catholic Church and it’s teachings on evolution, I know that they maintained (for a long time) that the earth is flat. But no self-respecting Baptist would go against the Bible on that notion, since Isaiah 40:21, 22a says, Have ye not known? Have ye not heard? Hath it not been told you from the beginning? Have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He (God) that sitteth upon the circle of the earth….


THOMAS CASSIDY
In addition to the previous poster explaining the common use of the Hebrew word (YOM) we must also note the word day (YOM), followed by an ordinal number (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and additionally defined as having an "evening" and "morning" seems pretty indicative of a common 24 hour period. Additionally, even though the sun was not yet formed, there was already light, and that light may have been the focus of the day in question. And even of that light was diffused all around the earth, the sideral day would still have existed. It seems silly to me to argue over something you don't believe in.


JHAPPEL
Why do you think evolutionary theory disputes the existance of God?

It contradicts the Bible. Plus its bad science.

and

Why is it that so many other religious people of all christian faiths accept the reality of the mountain of evidence that supports the theory of evolution? Heck, the catholic church even endorses evolution.

There is no mountain of evidence its more like a grain of sand. Non-theists accept it because they have no other choice.


If you insist on a literal interpretation of the bible, then do you think the earth is immobile and rests on pillars, or that the firmament is a solid thing which has doors/windows through which flood waters pass.

Because the Bible doesn't teach that. Learn some Hebrew before you start flaming the Bible.
[Administrator: There is a thread addressing this topic for those who are interested.]


JOE MEERT
Originally posted by Thomas Cassidy:
In addition to the previous poster explaining the common use of the Hebrew word (YOM) we must also note the word day (YOM), followed by an ordinal number (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and additionally defined as having an "evening" and "morning" seems pretty indicative of a common 24 hour period. Additionally, even though the sun was not yet formed, there was already light, and that light may have been the focus of the day in question. And even of that light was diffused all around the earth, the sideral day would still have existed. It seems silly to me to argue over something you don't believe in.

How do you know this? Does the bible indicate that God started the earth spinning on those first days? It does not.


HELEN
Trying to go down a couple of subject in this thread:

1. Evolutionary theory does not actually dispute the EXISTENCE of God, but it marginalizes Him as totally unnecessary, which is about as good as not existing! Either way, it's an insult to God.

2. 24 hour days are extremely well-defined by Genesis 1. They are marked off, each, as having an evening and a morning. This means the earth was rotating on its axis in relation to a directional light source. The ordinal numbers used with 'yom', the Hebrew word for 'day' are also explicit markers of a literal meaning. When 'day' is used otherwise in the Hebrew it is defined with a prepositional phrase (in the day of the Lord; in the days of the kings... etc.) or by an explicit metaphor or simile meant to be taken that way "a thousand years are like a day..."
Without using reference to hours and minutes, which were not defined for a LONG time later, the most accurate and precise way to describe a 24 hour day is by using exactly those two methods -- describing parts of a day (evening and morning) and numbering them.

3. The directional light source before the sun with made was probably a quasar in the middle of our Milky Way Galaxy. Quasars are not just bright stars -- they are brighter than entire galaxies, and it appears that they form around black holes, one of which we have in the middle of the Milky Way now. Since we are on an arm of the Milky Way Galaxy, a quasar in the center would have shone in our sky extraordinarily brightly before it was accreted into the black hole, and its light would have definitely been directional. If folks will look in Job 38:7, they will see reference to 'morning stars' the first moments of creation. Astronomers today recognize two entire separate generations of stars -- population one and population two stars. There are some which are 'blurred' in between as our galaxy has evidently 'cannabalized' some stars, but the two populations of stars would be shown to be biblical by Job 38:7 and Genesis on day 4.
Information on star populations from standard sources are easily available on the web.

4. Was Adam only one man? Yes. Here is what Paul says:
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned ...
Romans 5:12
Jude lists Adam as seven before Enoch -- a direct line of descent from one individual to another.

5. And no, the Bible is not to be "interpreted." It is to be read and accepted or rejected on its own terms. When it is claiming to present historical fact, that is clear, as in Genesis, and it needs to be accepted or rejected accordingly. When there is poetry, the grammar in the Hebrew is entirely different, giving us clear markers that poetic license may be used. When allegories and parables are used, there are likewise clear indications. It is not left up to the honest reader to 'interpret' anything. The only addition to this statement would be that knowing idiomatic usages can add to the depth of meaning, but they will not change it. The idea of 'interpreting' the Bible is nonsense if it is the Word of God. And if it isn't, there is no reason to bother with it as it would then be a series of lies not worth bothering with at all.



LATE CRETACEOUS
Thanks to everyone for their input.

Why can't the story of creation be regarded as a metaphore? The essence of the story, the message still gets through even if one does not regard the story of creation as a literal depiction of the earth. I mean this in the same sense that a surgeon would not look to the bible for a lesson on anatomy and surgical techniques.

In PBS's program "Evolution" they had an episode called "The Mind's Big Bang". Accordingly, about 30K years ago human behaviour radically changed. They started creating art and making more sophisticated tools. ALthough humans had spread over much of the old world, this seems to have occured in Africa and spread rapidly - overtaking other human populations such as the Neanderthals. That would make us all descendants of one small tribe or even an individual. Could it be that prior to this transformation humans were not really self aware, could not fathom a higher power, could not reason and therefor could not sin. Then we descendants of this "adam" can now be held accountable for our actions.


JOE G. MEERT
1. Evolutionary theory does not actually dispute the EXISTENCE of God, but it marginalizes Him as totally unnecessary, which is about as good as not existing! Either way, it's an insult to God.

That is very judgemental on your part. Many of my Christian friends consider your narrow viewpoint an insult to God.


3. The directional light source before the sun with made was probably a quasar in the middle of our Milky Way Galaxy. Quasars are not just bright stars -- they are brighter than entire galaxies, and it appears that they form around black holes, which we have in the middle of the Milky Way now.

The bible says NONE of this. All this talk of a literal bible was tossed out the window quickly.


LATE CRETACEOUS
If there is only one way to interpret the bible, that being literal, then why are there so many different sects all claiming to have the correct Word?

Helen, how many people in the history of our world have been killed, raped, displaced, robbed, tortured, oppressed or mutilated over differences in scientific opinion. How many people have suffered like that over differences in religious beleifs?



JOHN WELLS
"If there is only one way to interpret the bible, that being literal, then why are there so many different sects all claiming to have the correct Word?"

That's a good question. The answer is logical, but not something for Christians to be proud of. First of all, by nature we humans tend to be a disagreeable lot, although that is non-existant around here! Second, Satan works around the clock to divide, water down, pervert, twist, whatever he can do to people's understanding of God's Word. Satan works part-time in the bars, but full-time in the church! The Bible refers to Satan as "the author of lies." So, it's sad that Christians cannot get along better than we do, but Satan will have none of that. Believer's sins are atoned for, not eliminated by the blood of Jesus. So we are not perfected . . . yet! The important thing is, we don't have to be perfect in our understanding of the Bible. We just have to accept the atonement for our sins by Jesus Christ, and make Him Lord of our lives.

There's an excellent website that discusses the major world religions at: http://www.simpletruth.org/

The litmus test of any religion is: does its teachings match up with reality? Does living by it enhance the human condition? An objective study will clearly reveal the teachings of the Bible to extradinarily pass this test. ALL others run into major flaws.

[ January 12, 2002: Message edited by: Administrator ]

 

HELEN
To Late Cretaceous: You asked, "Why can't the story of creation be regarded as a metaphore? The essence of the story, the message still gets through even if one does not regard the story of creation as a literal depiction of the earth. I mean this in the same sense that a surgeon would not look to the bible for a lesson on anatomy and surgical techniques"

Genesis COULD be anything, but that is not the point. What is presents itself as is literal history. It was accepted as real and literal history by every writer of the Bible who referred to the beginning. Jesus referred to it several times, quite clearly indicating He did not consider it metaphor. Secondly, Genesis presents the basis for every major biblical doctrine. If their beginnings are metaphorical, why waste time with any of it? Thirdly, the language of Genesis is the language of historical narrative. It presents none of the elements of metaphor, myth, parable, or allegory. So we either have to accept it or reject it on its own terms, the same way we would with any other historical narrative. Please consider as well that the need for Christ is based on what happened in Genesis.
Scratch one and you might as well scratch the other.

Yes, I know the Bible is 'interpreted' many different ways. People are people! Look at what the U.S. has done with the Constitution! And that certainly is shorter, historical, and awfully clear! From what I have seen of people and the Bible, it is kind of common for a group to get the hang of a few particular verses and sort of elevate them above the rest, which distorts the whole picture. I'm sure I have that problem, too, actually, being human and all. But that does not mean that we should not try to get to know the entire Bible well enough to be able to understand what it is actually saying in sum total. A number of years ago, for this very reason, I started to discipline myself to go through the entire Bible every year. It's only 3.5 chapters a day, which is pretty easy. And I got knocked off my complacency about a lot of my ideas pretty fast! And each year I get corrected a little more, and that's a very good thing for me. I would like to think I am pulling, bit by bit, away from that old problem of remembering certain, comfortable (usually) things, and sort of ignoring the rest. It's hard to ignore when you read it every year. Most of the brothers and sisters in Christ that I know have not read the entire Bible once through. That may be one reason why there are so many competing ideas about what it says….

About the PBS program - I have a list of reviews which do not have very complimentary things to say about it. It was not only basic propaganda, it was very poorly presented propaganda and included a number of downright lies.
Please do not take anything they said as true simply because they said it. It was a very, very poor job, and so obviously biased and one-sided as to be an embarrassment.

You maybe should be aware, as well, that the earliest records we have that are verifiable as per time and not a matter of interpretation to fit an evolutionary framework are with the early Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Indus River civilizations. They literally appear full-blown almost out of nowhere.

I appreciate your ideas regarding a new self-awareness in humans perhaps occurring during some stage of evolutionary development, but what we see in humans requires far more than that. There is a total gulf which separates humans from animals. We use language for abstract communications of abstract thoughts. Animals have basic communication. We have a drive toward individual creativity in what we do and say and are. Animals show some inherent individuality, but no driving desire to be uniquely creative. (What we see are identical nests by the same type of bird and that sort of thing). Humans have a drive to figure out things, a sense of something called 'right' and 'wrong,' Animals get the hang of beneficial and hurtful, but that is not the same thing. There is something dramatically different about people. It's a new thing; a different thing. The Bible refers to it as spirit. It is how the Bible tells us we are created in the image of God.

And, lastly, you asked about religious wars vs. scientific wars. I had to laugh. That is honestly one I have not heard before. That was a sort of refreshing change!

Oh yeah, there have been religious wars! But when you look at them, are they really about religion? Most of them (not all) have been about land and money. Wars over territory, trade routes, solidifying power - that sort of thing. Religion is often simply an excuse. But it's been a convenient one, granted! But about science - the western science we have today is Christianity's child, did you know that? There are a number of excellent books tracing that. The one I think presents it quite clearly is by Charles Thaxton and Nancy Pearcey, entitled "The Soul of Science." The first chapters trace the history of western science. It was not until the last few hundred years that science separated from its religious roots.

But the sort of war I HAVE seen in science is much more subtle. It takes place here, on the forums. It takes place in courtrooms and educational establishments and in the press and journals. It is much more like guerilla warfare, and it is continuous. And people get badly hurt, yes. With evolution in the power seat, creationists lose their jobs, grants, publishing rights, tenure, sabbaticals, and sometimes their health and families over issues they believe in. It's a different sort of war, but I don't think there is anyone involved who would say 'war' is too strong a word anymore.


And, to Joe…
Joe, one deep essential of the Christian faith is that there is a witness God has put in creation itself, which testifies to Him. This is not just a 'oh aren't the butterflies pretty!' think, but solid investigative science which is then considered in light of the Bible. If that bothers you, that's the way it goes. I have no trouble accepting the Bible as presenting God's parameters on where the truth in science is. That does not mean it is a science text or anywhere near one. Texts are written by men who understand only partial truths and are trying to pass on what they BELIEVE to be true. The Bible, under God's inspiration, presents where the parameters of scientific truth lie and leaves us free to explore from there. The concept of a quasar being the first light fits both biblically and scientifically. I could be wrong, and, again, I don't mind being wrong. But it not wrong to explore possibilities and look at everything. In fact, as a creationist, I think I am far freer to do that than the evolutionist is, philosophically. I am not at all afraid of crossing anyone's ideas about how things 'really' are only to see them change tomorrow. I don't have to deal with that kind of frustration. I know where the boundaries of the truth are and I know everything inside them is fair territory for mental and scientific exploration. Again, if that bothers you, I'm sorry. But it has nothing to do with abandoning Bible, but rather with appreciating it.

THOMAS CASSIDY
How do you know this? Does the bible indicate that God started the earth spinning on those first days? It does not…

I know this because there was an "evening" and a "morning." Jewish perceptions of a "day" involve first an "evening" which begins the day, followed by a "morning" which completes the day.

A study of the rest of the uses of YOM in the bible confirms this understanding.


JOE MEERT
Yes, and amazingly there was no sun or moon for those first few 'yoms'. Sorry, all this rationalizing about the bible are merely semantical arguments. A literal reading of the bible indicates that there could not have been an evening and a morning during the first part of creation. The constant rationalization of the bible is required by those who wish to worship it as a science text!


WISSENSCHAFTLER
I noticed that at the top of this page is the message "The TRUTH shall set you free!". As a Christian and as a scientist I believe that their are objective facts and truths that are independent of one's religion, opinion etc. One such truth is the great age of the universe. The fact that we can see galaxies millions and billions of light years away is proof enough that the universe is more than just about 6000 years old, which is what YECs appear to believe.

Go out at night at this time of year in the northen hemisphere when there is no moon, and away from city lights, and you will see overhead in the constellation of Andromeda a fuzzy patch of light. That is the famous galaxy in Andromeda which is about 2 1/2 million light years away. In a 6000 year old universe it would not be visible.


HELEN
What if the speed of light has not been constant? Here, from the secular side:
http://arXiv.org/PS_cache/astro-ph/pdf/0007/0007108.pdf
Charge Conservation and time varying speed of light
http://www.ldolphin.org/dethrone.html
Maguiejo interview
http://www.newscientist.com/ns/19990724/isnothings.html
John Barrow New Scientist Article, "Is Nothing Sacred?"
http://www.varsity.utoronto.ca/archives/120/oct07/scitech/faster.html -- John Moffat's take
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/astro-ph/9811018 -- A&M paper, Physics Review D
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/astro-ph/9811022 -- Barrow paper from Physics Review D
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/astro-ph/9907340
Astrophysical Probes of the Constancy of the Velocity of Light


and from a creationist point of view: http://www.setterfield.org/scipubl.html

That would make all the difference, don't you think?


WISSENSCHAFTLER
I looked at some of those links, but the first in pdf format does not come out very clearly on my screen.

No, none of these would matter. The scientific links talk about the possible change in the speed of light in the very early universe, i.e. prior to or during the inflationary epoch of the Big Bang around 10^-22 seconds after creation itself, and Setterfield's work is complete nonsense.

The Big Bang took place about 14 billion years ago, give or take a couple of billion years. The Andromeda galaxy is only about 2 1/2 million light years away, so any ray of light from it would not have been affected by conditions in the very early universe. We can see from various processes in the Andromeda galaxies and many other nearby galaxies that the laws of physics are the same there as in the laboratory. I.e., the spectra due to atoms are the same as in the lab, apart from any Doppler shift.


THOMAS CASSIDY
Originally posted by Joe Meert:
A literal reading of the bible indicates that there could not have been an evening and a morning during the first part of creation.

LOL!
Genesis 1:5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

Genesis 1:8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

Genesis 1:13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.

Genesis 1:19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

Genesis 1:23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

Genesis 1:31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

You can't get more literal than what it literally says!


Originally posted by Wissenschaftler:
The fact that we can see galaxies millions and billions of light years away is proof enough that the universe is more than just about 6000 years old, which is what YECs appear to believe.

Welcome, Scientist (Wissenschaftler). I suspect the reason YECs can see the distant galaxies can be found in Genesis 1:15 "And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so." (1 Mose 1:15 "und sie sollen als Lichter an der Wölbung des Himmels dienen, um auf die Erde zu leuchten! Und es geschah so.")

The bible tells us God created the sun, moon, and stars (verse 16) to "give light upon the earth." If God had created the distant stars and galaxies, then forgot to create the light in such a way that it "gave light upon the earth" He would not have been much of a God, would He?


JOE MEERT
I am pleased to keep you in stitches. There was no sun for evening and morning initially. I suspect the people who wrote the bible did not think to make the creation story coherent scientifically. no problem with that since there is nothing scientific to the bible.


JOHN PAUL
Originally posted by Wissenschaftler:
The fact that we can see galaxies millions and billions of light years away is proof enough that the universe is more than just about 6000 years old, which is what YECs appear to believe.

Try reading Dr. Russell Humphreys' book, Starlight & Time. It explains how such a thing is possible.

Seven Years of Starlight & Time http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-338.htm

From my understanding the 6,000 year figure is based upon genealogies in the Bible as put forth by Bishop Ussher (sp?) quite awhile ago. I have also read that is not etched in stone. Many people make the mistake of holding YECs to that date, which is an injustice to YECs. Most of the arguments I hear about the 6,000 year date stem from the fact that civilizations have a continuous history through what would be the Flood year. So what if the Earth is really 12,000 years old and the Flood occurred 10,000 years ago? One problem is alleviated but another arises (where did 12,000 years ago come from?).
Most of the issues I once had with a young earth were alleviated by Dr. Humphreys book. However some remain, but not enough to make me believe in billions of years...


JHAPPEL
You don't think ancient authors could figure out you need the sun for morning? To me that is good evidence that Genesis is divinely inspired. God did not need the sun for light since he is the light of the world.


JOE MEERT
then why did he make the sun? Seems silly and redundant. scientifically, it assumes that God exists and that he casts some kind of light which only illuminates 1/2 the earth. Surely, you don't mean to imply God is only half bright, do you?


WISSENSCHAFTLER
To Thomas Cassidy and John Paul,
Well in fact the light from distant galaxies can't have been miraculously created in transit, as we see events such as exploding stars in them. For example in 1987 a star was seen to explode in a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way called the Large Magellanic Cloud. It is the closest galaxy to us, excluding possibly one other small galaxy, but even so, the star that was seen to explode was at a distance of about 168,000 light years. This is very close by cosmic standards but completely refutes the idea that the universe is only 6000 years old. Even making it 12,000 won't alter the situation. In 1886 a star was seen to explode in the Andromeda galaxy, and every years many stars are seen to explode in galaxies millions and even billions of light years away.

Of course you could claim that God created light in transit with the deception of an old universe, but then you are calling God a deceiver, which contradicts the fact that the heavens declare the glory of God.

As to Russell Humphreys, I knew he would turn up sooner or later. Check out
http://www.reasons.org/resources/apologetics/unravelling.html He proposes some sort of a strange white hole cosmology, but provides no evidence at all for this, and many other parts of his theory. Yes, probably some of his relativity may be correct, but his science is all wrong. E.g. the huge gravitational fields he requires to produce the time dilation he proposes would have big effects on the motion of the stars in our galaxy. No such effects are observed. His theory does not adequately explain the 3 degree microwave background, nor the abundances of hydrogen, helium and lithium and their isitopes in interstellar space.

Quite independent of Russell Humphreys, we can see from the dynamics of the asteroids and moons in our solar system that it is much much more that a few thousand years old. The age of the oldest meteorite, the sun and Jupiter, for example, all turn out to be about 4.5 billion years old using several different and completely independent dating methods. We can see white dwarf stars in the solar neighbourhood, which are at least several million years old, as there is no way to form them a few thousand years ago.


JOHN PAUL
God is hardly a deceiver when God's Word says it plain & simple. What is deceptive is mankind's interpretation of the evidence.

The link did not work for me. If it to Dr. Hugh Ross's website you should know that Dr. Humphreys has responded to his claims and rebutted them all. As for the microwave background, Dr. Humphreys seems to think his idea has that covered. Have you even read his work on this subject? That is besides the article I linked to?

Quite independent of Russell Humphreys, we can see from the dynamics of the asteroids and moons in our solar system that it is much much more that a few thousand years old. The age of the oldest meteorite, the sun and Jupiter, for example, all turn out to be about 4.5 billion years old using several different and completely independent dating methods. We can see white dwarf stars in the solar neighbourhood, which are at least several million years old, as there is no way to form them a few thousand years ago.

Could you please expand on the independent dating methods for the oldest meteorites (radiometric I assume), the Sun and Jupiter. Again all distant starlight, white dwarfs or not, is explained under Dr. Humphreys' cosmology.
Maybe it ain't poifect but whose ideas are? I say let's work on it instead of trying to trash it.


LATE CRETACEOUS
Not only is the universe more wonderful then we suppose, but more wonderful then we can suppose.

I don't know who originally said that, but it is fitting.

In recent centuries science has taught us, and continues to teach us, much about the universe. It is turning out to be bigger, more complex and more awe-inspiring then any body could have possibly imagined. And when you look into the realm of quantum dynamics, where time and space become blurred and there are more dimentions then we are aware of, you are reaching the limits of even the brightest human minds to comprehend.


THOMAS CASSIDY
Originally posted by Wissenschaftler:
Of course you could claim that God created light in transit with the deception of an old universe, but then you are calling God a deceiver, which contradicts the fact that the heavens declare the glory of God.

Why do you consider appearance of age a deception? If we saw Adam 30 seconds after his creation we would see what to our way of thinking was a 30 year old man. Appearance of maturity does not equal deception. It seems you have tried to put words into my mouth ("but then you are calling God a deceiver") based on your faulty understanding of my position.


WISSENSCHAFTLER
John Paul,
The link I gave was correct, but for some reason the period after "html" was made part of the link. Try again without the last period removed. Yes I know, Russell Humphreys has responded to rebuttals, but I'm sorry, he is just plain wrong. His theory just does not fit the evidence. If he is confident that he is correct, he should submit his work to a peer reviewed scientific journal, such as Astrophysical Journal. I have not in fact read his book, so I can't pass full judgement, but Hugh Ross, who is a qualified astrophysicist, has read it, and seriously criticizes it.
It's not a matter of his opinion versus Humphreys, or his theology versus Humphreys, it's simply that he know much more about the subject than Humphreys.

As to independent dating methods, meteorites are dated from radiometric decay. Jupiter is dated based on the heat escaping from it, and the sun is dated based on its detailed internal structure and the amount of helium in its interior. As the sun ages helium builds up in its interior and alters its structure.

White dwarfs are not explained by Humphreys erroneous cosmology, as many are too close, the closest being only about 9 light years away, and is a companion of the bright winter star Sirius. A white dwarf forms when a star is at the end of its life as a red giant and throws off its outer layers leaving the very hot interior core as a stellar "cinder". To cool down from its intial temperature of about 200,000 Kelvin or so down to say 25,000 Kelvin for the white dwarf companion of Sirius takes of the order of 100 million years, though I don't know the exact figure. The point is it's impossible to form a 25,000 Kelvin white dwarf in a 6000 year old universe.


Thomas Cassidy,
You are using a classic case of circular argument to prove the appearance of age, by using your interpretation of the Bible, namely Adam, to prove your interpretation of the Bible, namely a 6000 year old universe. Yet you have not produced any bones or other evidence of the remains of Adam in some museum to back up your argument.

Moreover, craters on the moon, the earth and other objects in the solar system show that the solar system is old, and has scars. The appearance of age I'm talking about is evidence of a past history, which within the young earth creationist framework is meaningless, as it implies scares of a non-existant past history. It's rather like Adam being created with a scar from when he fell out of a tree at the age of 5. All around us and in the universe is evidence of past real events. To deny this you are contradicting truth, and deviating from the idea of a Christian who is supposed to be seeking the truth.

WISSENSCHAFTLER
Incidentally, YECism is a modern revival in late 20th century and early 21st century USA amongst the evangelical comunity. Early in the 20th century many leaders in the evangelical comunity accepted the great age of the earth and the universe, even though the figures were far less well known compared today, although many did not accept evolution.

It was a 7th Day Adentist, George McCready Price, who was responsible for reviving YECism before WWII. Then in the early 1960s Henry Morris and John Whitcome wrote a book on Noah's Flood which really got YECism on the move.

 

THOMAS CASSIDY
You seem to have misunderstood my question. Here it is again. Appearance of maturity does not equal deception.
Why do you think it does?


WISSENSCHAFTLER
I did not misunderstand your question. Appearance of maturity with functionality is not deception, but appearance of maturity with a past redundant and non-functional fake history is deception. E.g. we can see craters on the earth that have obviously suffered processes of erosion over very long periods of time, in many cases millions of years. To propose that God created craters with the appearance of age which serve no purpose in creation is completely absurd

Likewise we can see light from distant galaxies that has experienced absorption in intergalactic space on its way to us. To propose that God created light beams in transit to us 6000 years ago, and implanted the fingerprint of fake gas absorption as if the light beams had been traveling for millions of years is outrageously absurd.


CARTESIAN KID
I think Wissen's point is that any appearance of age, not functional maturity, would be an act of deception on God's part. For instance, you would be correct that Adam would have looked like a grown man perhaps in his 30s; however, he would not have had the signs of aging that a 30-year old man has, such as worn teeth, liver spots (which every human begins accumulating by the time they're a teenager), gray hair, etc. In fact, I would be willing to bet that a well-trained medical physiologist would have been able to discern that Adam was very recently created due to the noticeable lack of all of these signs of aging. Now if you grant that God created Adam with all of these signs of aging (which I'm willing to bet that you're not) then you would have to concede that God would have created Adam with a deceptive appearance. Wissenschaftler's example of the traveling light is a parallel situation, since light picks up obvious signs of aging as it travels through millions of light years of distances. In the same manner, God could have created the light already here instantaneously; yet, it would have been completely unnecessary(and downright deceptive) to add in these signs of aging on light beams. Not to mention, the many stellar events, such as supernovae, that are farther than 10,000 light years away and would have to have been created without the event itself ever having happened. Russell Humphrey's cosmology (and I have read his book Starlight and Time) just does not stand up to scrutiny, and if it did, he would almost certainly have published it in one of the peer-reviewed astrophysical journals by now.


MR BEN
John Paul: God is hardly a deceiver when God's Word says it plain & simple. What is deceptive is mankind's interpretation of the evidence.

You've put your finger on it.
God did not have to place all of the tell tale evidence for how his laws of nature came together to cause us to be. That he chose to make this evidence available to us if we looked closely is clear evidence that he meant for us to learn it.

On the other hand, the misinterpretation and misquotation of God pertaining to the details of creation written in Genesis is purely a work of man. It may be an honest and earnest mistake by those early authors, not having had the advantage of education that we have today, but mistaken it clearly is.

God doesn't lie, and he wouldn't have put those fossils in the ground, and given us the powers of reason to find and interpret them, if he hadn't meant for us to know the truth.


THOMAS CASSIDY
God created a mature universe with examples of every form and function you would expect from a mature universe.. Functional maturity does not only mean size/ability, but also the workings of a fully functional form, including those normal attributes of our universe such as crators, pulsars, novas, et al.


HELEN
Hi Thomas,
Although it certainly is possible for God to have created a mature universe, I think the Bible gives us a clue to something else. In Job, Psalms, Isaiah (and, I think, a couple of other prophets), God says he "stretched" out the heavens. That seems to be a process.

What is interesting is that there is something very different between stretching and something simply expanding under its own power, as is postulated with the BB. Stretching invests that which is stretched with potential energy -- like a rubber band being stretched tight. If what God has given us in the world we experience is any help (and it may not be in this case, but it's all I have to go on at this time in my life!), the potential energy locked into a stretched fabric will release on its own, becoming kinetic energy released into the surrounds. The rubber band has too little potential energy stored in it compared to the air around it for anyone to notice a change in heat energy (which is how it would translate), but the stretching of the heavens would have been an enormous investment of energy into the fabric of space -- energy which would have to be released through time.

As with any stored potential energy in a stretched fabric, it will release more quickly at first and then slow down -- gradually to nothing. But it's that initial fast phase that may be important here. The initial processes of star and galaxy formation may have been extraordinarily swift.

Picture, if you will, kids in one of those round, above ground pools. We had one for a long time and one of their favorite tricks was to create a whirlpool with several of them moving as fast as possible around the perimeter, all in one direction. When they stopped, the whirlpool would continue and then slow down and finally stop.

God says he stretched out the universe. It is in the past, completed tense in the Hebrew. In other words, that expansion, or stretching, is not continuing. But the release of energy is. We see it in historic measurements of some of the 'atomic constants' which have not remained so constant.

This says nothing, however, about the earth itself. This was divinely and specifically created for us, and we were given dominion over it. So while I think you are absolutely correct about life on earth being created mature, maybe the heavens weren't, but were simply organized a whole lot faster than anything we see today.

It is, by the way, because evolutionists see the slowness of the processes today that they presume ancient ages. But actual physics doesn't always agree with this presumption...


WISSENSCHAFTLER
Hi Thomas,
Please explain to me what function impact craters have for the universe to operate. The moon Miranda belonging to the planet Uranus was only discovered in 1948, and craters were found on it when Voyager II flew past it in 1986.

What function would craters have on a Miranda play, and how can Miranda be used for signs and seasons when a large telescope is needed to see it, and it was unknown until 1948?

I state again, crater are scares of ancient impacts, and play no role in the functioning of the universe. Please explain them in the context of a 6000 year old universe, what mechanisms created them?


HANKD
I state again, crater are scares of ancient impacts, and play no role in the functioning of the universe

What evidence do you have that they don't play a role in the functioning of the universe?


DAVID PLAISTED
Originally posted by Helen:
Although it certainly is possible for God to have created a mature universe, I think the Bible gives us a clue to something else. In Job, Psalms, Isaiah (and, I think, a couple of other prophets), God says he "stretched" out the heavens. That seems to be a process…

Another thing is that the creation was to reveal God's eternal nature so in a sense it had to look eternal, at least very old, from the start. Also we know from recent experiments that it is possible for things to travel faster than light -- this is a common misconception that nothing can travel faster than light. In fact a physicist was annoyed at all of the hoopla about faster than light travel and said it was nothing special. It only requires the right kind of phase shift dependent on frequency and there it is. Having said all this, I'm still not sure that the Bible requires a young universe.


THOMAS CASSIDY
Originally posted by Wissenschaftler:
Please explain to me what function impact craters have for the universe to operate.

Crators are a part of a mature universe. The universe was created mature. Ipso facto, it contains crators.


CARTESIAN KID
Appearance of age means that the heavens don't "reveal knowledge" to us, rather they reveal a phony history.


WISSENSCHAFTLER
HankD,
you said "What evidence do you have that they don't play a role in the functioning of the universe?" It's up to you to show the evidence that craters do play a role, not for me to prove a negative. I could just as easily claim that pink unicorns landed on the far side of the moon, then challenge you to prove that this did not happen.

Thomas Cassidy,
You said "Crators are a part of a mature universe. The universe was created mature. Ipso facto, it contains crators." Talk about circular logic! You have said nothing at all, and have offered no explanation for what role craters play.


HELEN
Hi guys,
I do have and have read Humphreys’ book. I have read Ross's material and I have read critiques of both men.

Humphreys, first of all, has done some excellent work which is almost unrecognized. He did predict, successfully as opposed to the mainstream scientists, the magnetic fields which would be found on some of the other planets. He did it using some things the Bible said about creation as a guide. Because of his presupposition of the Bible as a truthful guide, which he freely admitted, his work was acknowledge with astonishment by peers and then quietly buried with a few derogatory comments available by those on the net who only read Talk Origins junk.

His book, Starlight and Time, ventures where few have dared, actually, into the possibility of a white hole cosmology. And models -- especially experimental models such as this -- are for pushing and pulling and shoving around. It's true that a lot of creationists have latched onto it as almost gospel, and that is too bad -- and wrong. It puts Humphreys in a very difficult position. The model may be entirely wrong -- a lot of models in science are. But it causes people to consider, to think, to analyze -- and that's a good thing.

As far as Hugh Ross is concerned, it is better to look to someone else for critiques, I think. He is like a Kent Hovind in his own part of the playyard -- good speaker, terrific following, and plays fast and loose with facts (and the Bible) when it suits him.

Some of Ross's false claims have been responded to by Humphreys here: http://www.trueorigin.org/ca_rh_02.asp

There is plenty else on Ross available, but for the purposes of this discussion, that may be enough right now.

Unlike Mr. Cassidy, I have no problem with the reality of meteorite hits resulting in craters on objects in our solar system. Dr. Danny Faulkner did present an interesting thought at a conference a couple of years ago and I wrote it up for the net here: http://www.trueorigin.org/dfonmoon.asp

In fact, I think the cratering we see, and where we see it, gives us some very important clues about what has happened in the past. And -- gasp -- this from a YEC!


CARTESIAN KID
First of all, Humphreys did not make those predictions based on anything in the Bible but from his white hole cosmology theory. Secondly, his predictions were not that impressive considering he had a narrow ballpark range to guess from based on the values of the known magnetic values of some of the other planets. This quote from Tim Thompson sums up why these predictions are fairly unimpressive:

It is for this reason that I am not impressed by Humphreys' confidence in his theory's ability to predict the magnetic dipole moments for Uranus and Neptune, before the Voyager spacecraft observed them. Humphreys' predictions for Uranus [20, page 146] and Neptune [20, page 147] both state that the dipole strength should be "on the order of 10^24 J/T". He connects these predictions to his theory by selecting a value for k = 0.25 in both cases, computing a dipole strength at creation, and then estimating a characteristic decay time assuming a core conductivity similar to the terrestrial planets.
This brings on the estimate of 10^24 J/T, but remember that the dipole at creation is an entirely free parameter. A peek at Humphreys' table II [20, page 147] shows that the dipole for Jupiter is 1.6 x 10^27, for Saturn 4.3 x 10^25, and for Earth 7.9 x 10^22. From these values alone, with reference to no theory at all, one can immediately see that the dipole values for Uranus and Neptune must be larger that Earth's 10^22 and smaller than Saturn's 10^25, so that anything in the 10^23 to 10^24 range is an obvious guess anyway. All Humphreys has to do is come up with a dipole at creation that is about the same as Saturn's is now, and the result is going to be very nearly right. We now know the dipole values for Uranus [3.7 x 10^24 J/T] and Neptune [2.1 x 10^24 J/T], which do indeed agree with Humphreys' order of magnitude predictions. But to hail this as a confirmation of his theory is not very rewarding. Indeed, it is my position that Humphreys' theory cannot be confirmed, since it predicts at once every possible observed field, and is therefore useless for predicting anything.

The quote is located at: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/magfields.html
I know that it's "Talk Origins Junk," but it's still a correct assessment of the whole affair.


The model may be entirely wrong -- a lot of models in science are. But it causes people to consider, to think, to analyze -- and that's a good thing.

I agree that that's a good thing, and there's certainly nothing wrong with someone proposing a model, but when it fails to withstand the light of empirical scrutiny from other professionals in the field, then there comes a point where it needs to be canned. One of the first problems that I recognized with his white hole cosmology is that the supposed event horizon that constricted as the matter of the universe was being ejected reached the earth on day four, causing earth clocks to slow down while clocks in the rest of the universe ran at a faster rate (this is his explanation as to why everything in the rest of the universe looks billions of years older, while the earth can still be young)would have also slowed down clocks in every other part of the universe that it passed. Earth is not the only location that the event horizon passed through; therefore, clocks would have been slowing down everywhere else in the universe that the event horizon passed, causing an overall equalizing effect of universal clocks. In other words, there would have been a point in time when the event horizon would have been somewhere else in the universe where clocks were running slower there than they were here. If that's the case then billions of years must have passed at our location also.

Anyway, it's ironic because Russell Humphreys theory actually turned out to be one of the primary reasons I gave up on the YEC position. I was a dyed-in-the-wool YEC for most of my Christian life (about 10 years), but Russell Humphreys provided such convincing arguments as to why the starlight must be billions of years old (he provides one of the most convincing refutations of all the other YEC arguments for starlight travel time) that when I realized that his model was also incorrect, there was nowhere left to turn but to the truth that the universe is vastly ancient. So I owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. Humphreys for revealing the truth to me.


As far as Hugh Ross is concerned, it is better to look to someone else for critiques, I think. He is like a Kent Hovind in his own part of the playyard -- good speaker, terrific following, and plays fast and loose with facts (and the Bible) when it suits him.

There is absolutely no comparison between the two men.

1. Hugh Ross has a legitimate doctoral degree in astrophysics from an accredited university.
Kent Hovind's only legitimate degree is a bachelor's degree. All of his graduate work was done through a degree mill that gave him a doctoral degree for a sum of money.

2. Hugh Ross has done legitimate scientific research on quasars at CalTech, where he published in peer-reviewed astrophysical journals.
Kent Hovind has done no scientific research, and his only claim to science is to have been a high school science teacher for 15 years.

3. Hugh Ross doesn't have to rely on razzle-dazzle stage tricks to persuade an audience of his position but provides sound evidence and logic.
Kent Hovind is clueless without his powerpoint presentation show and doesn't even show an elementary comprehension of science without it. (One need only hear the debate between them on the John Ankerberg Show to see this) The debate is located online at http://www.ankerberg.com/fankjasrd.htm

4. Hugh Ross has published many books that contain thought-provoking and substantive thought about the issues related to creationism.
Kent Hovind has written no books.

I could go on (the contrasts are innumerable), but that should be enough to suffice. Hugh Ross and Kent Hovind aren't even in the same ballpark.


THOMAS CASSIDY
Originally posted by Cartesian Kid:
Appearance of age means that the heavens don't "reveal knowledge" to us, rather they reveal a phony history.

Once again you have committed, or repeated, the logical fallacy of the False Analogy. You have confused "appearence of maturity" with "appearence of age."

And, of course, the existance of meteor impact creaters imparts knowledge to the intelligent observer. By looking at God's mature creation we can surmise that we should expect occasional impacts, and thus have an understanding of prophecies concerning such impacts.


Originally posted by Wissenschaftler:
You said "Crators are a part of a mature universe. The universe was created mature. Ipso facto, it contains crators." Talk about circular logic! You have said nothing at all, and have offered no explanation for what role craters play.

Please see my response to Cartesian Kid. It may help clear up your confusion.


Originally posted by Helen:
Unlike Mr. Cassidy, I have no problem with the reality of meteorite hits resulting in craters on objects in our solar system.

Helen, I don't have a problem with the reality of meteorite hits resulting in craters on objects in our solar system. It is an observable phenomenon. (I watched the Jupiter impacts a couple years ago. Awesome sight!) I have a problem with those who think God cannot create impact craters as a function of a mature universe.


JEFF
I have some questions for Thomas Cassidy regarding this statement:
I have a problem with those who think God cannot create impact craters as a function of a mature universe

Q1: Aside from speculating on the limitations of an alleged Omni-being, can you speculate on the 'why' a divine creator would use the appearance of an ancient creation to decieve those who study the 'creation' ? ( I.E. the scientists )

Q2: How do craters that appear very old, but are not very old, contribute to a mature 'function' ?

What is a "function of a mature universe" ?

What is the significance of a mature universe as opposed to a genuinely ancient universe ?

How does this serve ANY purpose other than to decieve humanity ?

Why has God resorted to lies ? Has He been limited some how by scripture ?


THOMAS CASSIDY
Q1: Asked and answered in my earlier thread. And, once again, the creation of a mature universe is not a deception. God told us exactly what He had done. The only way you can accuse Him of deception is to ignore what He said.

Q2: Asked and answered. See earlier post.


What is a "function of a mature universe"?

To declare the glory of God. Psalm 19:1; 97:6.


What is the significance of a mature universe as opposed to a genuinely ancient universe?

Reality.


How does this serve ANY purpose other than to decieve humanity?

Asked and answered.


Why has God resorted to lies?

He hasn't.


Has He been limited some how by scripture?

No.


HELEN
CK, I did not try to compare Hovind and Ross regarding education, publications, or even intelligence. But I do think the way they both deal with facts leaves a lot to be desired, and that is what I was commenting on. In other words, when old-agers quote Ross to me, I feel the same way a lot of you when someone tries to back himself up with something Hovind said.

As far as Humphreys work is concerned, his predictions were based on a liquid origin, not on a gaseous one. That is what I meant when I said they were based on Bible. And despite the TO spin, they were correct and the predictions based on gaseous origins were not. Excuse it however you will, that's just the way it was.

In regard to the appearance of maturity at creation, I do think that was limited to life on earth. The Bible refers to God stretching out the heavens, which means they had a beginning and that there were processes involved. We see reference to processes regarding the earth itself in Genesis 1. Personally, and again I not only may be wrong but I don't mind being wrong, but where I sit right now is that unless the Bible specifically mentions a miracle being involved, I look for God to be working through nature, which He invented to show us somewhat of His character (Romans 1).

Of course God COULD do anything He wants. But out of all the choices He had, He chose one particular way and I think He has given us pretty clear indications in the Bible to keep us on the right track in our science.

To go WAY out on a limb here, I think there is a reason for asteroids and meteorites that may tie in with the Setterfield model. A higher speed of light in the past would have meant a much higher rate of radioactive decay.
This would have produced enormous heat and there would have been some objects that exploded as a result. The planet that used to be between Mars and Jupiter may have met its fate in this way. Are meteors also the result of explosions at the same time? The possibility certainly exists if Setterfield is correct with his model.


JOHN PAUL
CK: First of all, Humphreys did not make those predictions based on anything in the Bible but from his white hole cosmology theory. Secondly, his predictions were not that impressive considering he had a narrow ballpark range to guess from based on the values of the known magnetic values of some of the other planets.

Two things- first Dr. Humphreys said he got his predictions from reading Scripture. Second how come no one else predicted the magnetic fields of those planets? Humphreys was closer than anyone else's predictions. Oh yeah, using the same data. Go figure...

[Also], according to Dr. Humphreys' cosmology (I take it you didn't read it very closely) the Earth was very close to the center of the white hole. Not much was left for the event horizon to pass once it passed the Earth. And billions of years wouldn't have passed on Earth, that is ONLY relative to what, if anything, is on the event horizon once it passed by the Earth.

An interview with Dr. Humphreys:

Well, a good scientific theory is one which makes predictions, and it was exciting to hear about several models of yours, based on creation, which generated successful predictions.

Dr. Humphreys:
One model was based on 2 Peter 3:5, which talks about how God made the earth, and I applied that. I took that as a clue, and had an idea about how God might have started out the earth's magnetic field. And then I found that worked fairly well and it gave the right strength for the earth's magnetic field.
So I then asked myself' 'Perhaps God used the same method to make the other bodies in the solar system, the sun and the moon and the planets?' So I calculated the fields of all the planets that we had already explored up to that time, which was 1984, and the theory gave right values for those planets also.
I published these results in a Creation Research Society Quarterly article in December, 1984, and in that article I said that a good test of my theory would be to check out what the strength of the fields of the planets Uranus and Neptune were' relative to my theory. For Uranus, the evolutionary predictions were generally about 100,000 times less than my published predictions, so I thought it was a good test.

Interviewer: So, what was the result when Voyager finally made the measurements?

DH:
The result was smack in the middle of my prediction, and 100,000 times greater than the evolutionary predictions. So the creation model was the clear winner in that case.

Interviewer: And for Neptune as well

DH:
Yes, that's right.

Interviewer: Did you get any comments from evolutionists about these fulfilled predictions?

DH:
Yes. Stephen Brush, a fairly well known anti-creationist in the United States, wrote to me after the first prediction came true' and I had mentioned this in an ICR Impact article. He said he was basically trying to find some way around the fact that I had made a prediction' and I wrote him a polite letter back and tried to explain things to him. He wrote another letter back and that was the end of the correspondence.
But about six months later, an article by him appeared in Science magazine. The gist of it was that 'Well, predictions are not really a way to do good science', so he was basically backing down from the classical scientific view that predictions are a good way to validate a theory.

The entire interview can be read http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1120.asp

 

[Administrator: this page is from a different, but related, thread]


JOHNV
The notion that the mainline scientific community summarrily dismisses evidence that supports creation is preposterous! The scientific community is not in the business of throwing out evidence that doesn't fit ther models. Rather, the models get changed to fit the evidence.

You can't walk into a lab with a bible, look around the room, and say "make everything in this room match what this book says".

If that were so, the earth would still be flat, and we'd still believe that the sun goes around the earth.

Science teaching creationism is like Hitler teaching a class on tolerance.

If someone with no knowlege of the story of Genesis or of Darwinism started looking at all the fossil and geological evidence, I wonder what conclusion they'd come up with.


MILAN
Sometimes I tell people who dont know much about evolution. Imagine you didnt know anything about biology, anything about phylogenetic data, anything about genetics. All you have is some paleontologic and geologic data,which shows you just this: There were dinosaurs in the past and there are no dinosaurs now. There were no mammals in the past and there are mammals now. What would you conclude?


HELEN
John,
Data is considered 'anomalous' when it does not match the preconceived notion of the current geological timescale. This is the throwing out of data. I would suggest that it is not the data that agree which we should be noticing, but the data that doesn't, which should draw our attention. I would suggest that data should not be excused away by various special pleadings, but be examined closely to find out if the current theory is wrong. Currently this is done much too rarely. The evolution paradigm is set in the proverbial concrete in the minds of those who promote and believe it. The Selling of Science by Dorothy Nelkin documents a small bit of this. There is a lot more, as evidenced by various complaints from various fields at different times and the additional exposure of the tip of the iceberg of fraud that goes on with a lot of funded research. The fraud often is related to producing the results that the funding companies are paying to see happen. Do they all get caught? Evidently, not by a long shot.
When Holmes was determining the radio time scales he used Lyell's time estimations as a guide and evidently threw out everything not considered in synchrony with it [http://www.rael.org/int/english/evidence/evidence/body_evolution2.html]

So yes, evidence is discarded -- some of which probably provides that support for a YEC position. White lab coats just do not mean white-hearted purity! I'm not painting with the sort of brush that says all are guilty of this, but the fact is that there are a reasonable number of results in science that are tailored to the desired preconceptions of what should be found.

Now, about your misconceptions about what the Bible teaches. It does not teach that the world is flat. The flat earth nonsense was a product of someone in the early nineteenth century and got carried into a sort of early urban legend.

It is not taught in the Bible that the sun goes around the earth. The reference to the sun rising and setting is the same that we use today.

Nor is the creation interpretation of science the opposite of science. It is the opposite of evolution, which is another way of interpreting science.

And, purely as a guess, I would think that a person unfamiliar with either interpretation would look at the fossils and geology and wonder what on earth happened. I would suggest that a lot of questions would be asked if the person was intelligent, and not that an immediate conclusion would be given.

Milan -- the fossil record does NOT tell us there were no mammals in the past. It does tell us that no mammals were fossilized in certain areas at certain times. The fossil record is a record of death, not life.

In addition, what is your conclusion regarding the fact that the Chinese calendar has eleven known animals and then a dragon. Why would they make up one? This is only one instance of what appear to be some kind of dinosaurs being known by men. How would you explain that?


QXR37
Helen: the fossil record does NOT tell us there were no mammals in the past. It does tell us that no mammals were fossilized in certain areas at certain times. The fossil record is a record of death, not life.

True. But although thousands or hundreds of thousands of mammal fossils of all kinds have been found in Cenozoic strata, we do not have a single example of a fossil mammal from one of the modern groups of large mammals (primates, hooved mammals, whales, felids and canines, etc.) outside of the Cenozoic. The only mammals outside the Cenozoic are the small shrewlike insectivores found in the Mesozoic and the mammal-like reptiles of the Permian and Triassic. This is a pretty unambiguous pattern, no? Likewise, although I'm sure we've found thousands or tens of thousands of dinosaur fossils, every single one is found in the Mesozoic strata, no exceptions whatsoever. And even within the dinosaurs and mammals there is considerable sorting...for example, you won't find a single ceratopsian (horned dinosaurs like Triceratops) outside the Cretaceous period. How can creationists explain this sort of thing?


In addition, what is your conclusion regarding the fact that the Chinese calendar has eleven known animals and then a dragon.

But the other animals in the calander are depicted in a fairly realistic way, while depictions of dragons don't really resemble any known dinosaur species at all. Also, I think I've heard that fossilized dinosaur bones were sometimes found by the Chinese and identified as "dragon's bones," which could be where the legends got their start.

JHAPPEL
"You can't walk into a lab with a bible, look around the room, and say "make everything in this room match what this book says".

If that were so, the earth would still be flat, and we'd still believe that the sun goes around the earth."

Nice straw man arguments. The best way for skeptics to dismiss the Bible is to set up a bunch of straw men misrepresenting what the Bible says and then ridicule it. The Bible can be used to interpret the evidence. You just have to look for it. It just that must people don't want to see the evidence. They hate the idea of having to be accountable to a personal God but would rather be a free bi-product of nature where anything goes. Its your preconcieved ideas that intrepret the evidence. The evidence doesn't interpret itself.


MILAN
Milan -- the fossil record does NOT tell us there were no mammals in the past. It does tell us that no mammals were fossilized in certain areas at certain times. The fossil record is a record of death, not life.

Indeed, but rather consistent, isnt it? Are you really saying that you believe that trilobites, dinosaurs, mammooths, dogs and human beings co-existed at the same time?
Are you really saying that you believe that trilobites, dinosaurs, mammoths, dogs and human beings co-existed at the same time?


In addition, what is your conclusion regarding the fact that the Chinese calendar has eleven known animals and then a dragon. Why would they make up one? This is only one instance of what appear to be some kind of dinosaurs being known by men. How would you explain that?

The literature of all peoples -particularly in the days of yore- is full of mythical creatures: unicorns, fairies, simurghs, basilisks, mermaids, fauns, satyrs, leprechauns, trolls, goblins, dragons, griffins, ghosts, angels, demons, vampires, werewolves, gods, demi-gods, etc etc.

Following your line of argument we would have to try to accommodate them in our phylogenetic trees. I think not.



JOHNV
Data is considere 'anomalous' when it does not match the preconceived notion of the current geological timescale. This is the throwing out of data.

Not quite. The evolutionary is constantly in a state of revision. Why? Because we are constantly finding new evidence. If something arises that doesn't fit the model, science asks why. Either we it's because we didn't fully understand the evidence, or the evidentiary model is incorrect.

A good example is th T-Rex. For years, we saw T-Rex as a cold-blooded hunter that stood upright and dragged its tail on the ground behind it. By the 80's, our understanding of bipedal dinosaurs increased greatly, so we saw T-Rex as warm-blooded, lean, and agile, not upright, but leaning forward, balancing its weight like a see-saw between its head and torso, and its tail, which now didn't drag, but was evenly elevated (remember the T-Rex in Jurassic Park?) Now, paleontologist Jack Horner is backing a theory that T-Rex wasn't a hunter, but a scavenger, pointing to the small forearms and the anatomy of the upper legbones, traits that one would expect to find in a scavenger. This is currently a hot topic of much debate. The model of T-Rex is in itself evolving. If your notion of anomilous data were accurate, science wouldn't even be entertaining the possibility that T-Rex was anything but a hunter, because we all want T-Rex to be like what we saw in Jurassic Park.



JHAPPEL
"Indeed, but rather consistent, isnt it? Are you really saying that you believe that trilobites, dinosaurs, mammoths, dogs and human beings co-existed at the same time?"

Of course. But they didn't all live in the same geographical area. Dinosaurs and man lived apart from each other by great distances. Before the flood man had probably only lived in one general area of the Earth and had not spread out until Babel.


EDGE
Then how about elephants or rhinos or other large mammals that would have shared the same niche as large dinosaur herbivores? Why is there not one example of them coexisting? Why wouldn't humans have hunted these herbivores and brought evidence back to their settlements? Do you have any environmental or geographic maps that suggest that your statement is true? Is there some kind of evidence?

As to man living in only one general area of the earth until the tower of Babel, I think archeological evidence is runningly strongly against you.


JHAPPEL
Creationists are working on trying to figure out what exactly the pre-flood world was like. One site that is working on this is http://origins.swau.edu/papers/global/chadwick/default.html. The fossil record is a record of burial not ages of animals.


"As to man living in only one general area of the earth until the tower of Babel, I think archeological evidence is runningly strongly against you."

Not really. Unless you are going to use radiometeric 'dates' to date ancient evidence.


JOHNV
I think, by the way,it's important to note that elephants and rhinos aren't mentioned in the Bible because they're not indigenous to the area where the early Israelites came from. That's pretty much true with all the animals mentioned in the Bible. No mention of penguins or ostriches (which are not birds of the air), kangaroos, bears, porpoises, and the like. In regard to animals they saw, but weren't accustomed to, there are generalizations (i.e. Jonah & the whale, which the is called a "big fish". Why do we not take this literally, but we take other things literally?)


Originally posted by jhappel:
The Bible can be used to interpret the evidence.

But the Bible WASN'T WRITTEN TO INTERPRET EVIDENCE!!! It was wtirren to tell us about our relationship with God. That's the ultimate example of taking the Bible out of context.

God INSPIRED the Bible. It was written by men. Ordinary, fallable, men!!! Men who were guided, not dictated to, by the Holy Spirit.

The word of God is not the letters on the page, it's the message on the page.

Genesis 1 was not written to tell us how life came about, but why God created us. That's why we are the only creation that's referred to as "very good".


FROGGIE
Originally posted by Milan:
Sometimes I tell people who dont know much about evolution. Imagine you didnt know anything about biology, anything about phylogenetic data, anything about genetics.

Well, If a person admitted ignorance about that many fields, I would say, "Well then, you have no business thinking that you know more about evolution than scientists who do know about these things!"

I would not ask a person who has never seen a computer how to program in JAVA. I would not ask a person who barely knows what DNA is to explain phylogenetic analysis to me. And I would not ask a person who has never read the Bible to explain what the book of Ecclesiastes means. It's that simple.

Now of course I think we can all become "mini experts" in whatever we want, for the purposes of learning about our world, and just knowing what is going on around us. I encourage more education for everyone naturally! And anyone is free to learn and question about science. But the danger of this amateur armchair analysis is that people often make incorrect conclusions based on their ignorance of the data and how the data is collected. It's sort of like the saying, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." But of course we all can't know everything! So what are we to do? I say--we have 'faith' that the experts are doing good science and that we tentatively trust their conclusions.

This I think is what we all mean when we say scientists have "faith" in their theories. I could not possibly learn and study enough to know the ins and outs of every biological principle to ensure that my experments are based on sound science. I have to trust that the people who invented PAGE gels, PCR, and cell assays knew what they were doing. And I also have to have "faith" in the system--that if a large group of scientists are wrong, than the evidence they collect and study will prove it wrong. I can't re-invent the wheel every time I do an experiment.
But I also can't trust that every theory held by scientists right now is the absolute truth.

The key to it all, I think, is to always keep a good balance between open-mindedness and skepticism, while always maintaining rational and critical thought processes.

A lot of creationists like to point out that scientists have been wrong before in the past. This is true. But I like to point out right back that the only reason we know they were wrong is because of other scientists who did better studies. We do NOT prove scientific theories and scientists wrong by abandoning our scientific and rational thought processes! And many cases where scientists were wrong, you can go back and look at what they did, and they were not doing sound science. The history of lobotomies is a prime example--which were often done for political or money motivations.


Oh, to answer the question that was actually asked in the subject line. . . [which was originally, “Why is a Six Day Creation Not Generally Accepted?]
Because the evidence overwhelmingly does not support a 6-day creation model.

Interestingly enough, the people who first studied evolution, geology, and radioactive decay did not set out to disprove the Bible. They were simply interested in studying God's world and wanted desparately to know the truth about how it worked.

Creationists accuse today's scientists of being biased against the Bible and in some cases, trying to prove the non-existence of God. Ok fine go ahead and think that. But what about the people back in the 1800's who first proposed these theories? We know from their writings and beliefs that many of them were Christians who believed in God, and their motivations were definitely not to disprove the Bible. Like Linnaus, who was collecting fossils to learn about God. (His data BTW we now today use to support evolution.) Darwin wanted to go to seminary school.

These scientists in the 1800s rejected the 6-day creation and the young earth idea because the evidence convinced them to. And you can't blame that on a liberal evolutionist conspiracy!



JHAPPEL
"But the Bible WASN'T WRITTEN TO INTERPRET EVIDENCE!!! It was wtirren to tell us about our relationship with God. That's the ultimate example of taking the Bible out of context."

My point was when the Bible mentions historical events in the past, those that believe the Bible as a trustworthy document can use scripture to interpret the evidence.

I disagree [with your interpretation of Genesis]. Why do you take this position? What in scripture makes you think this is not meant to be a historical account? What else in scripture is not meant to be historical?

I beleive the plain interpretation of the Bible. Whats wrong with that? What good is the Bible if the plain interpretation is not what is meant?

 

Administrator: the following page is from another, but similar, thread

RANDY WICKETT
According to the ark story marsupials and the other unique animals in Australia and New Zealand would have had to have get there after coming off a boat, in pairs, in the Middle East. Note that among the marsupials is a blind marsupial mole. Overall there are 13 families and about 180 unique species of marsupials in the area. There is also the Kiwi, a flightless bird and of course kangaroos. The only monotremes(egg laying mammals) in world, the platypus and 2 species of echidna are also found in the area. Meanwhile virtually no placental mammals are found in Australia or New Zealand. How is it that the marsupials and monotremes made it to Australia where they just happen to exist in fossil record while thousands of species of placental mammals that just happen not to exist in the Australian fossil record did not? How did blind marsupial moles make it at all, let alone getting there ahead of placental mammals? Of course this is far from being the only problem. How did the flightless dodo bird come off the ark amongst all those hungry predators and make it to Reunion island? How do you suppose those giant tortoises got to the Galapagos islands? The three toed sloth can only drag itself slowly on the ground it can’t walk. How did they make it to the Americas, where sloths just happen to exist in the fossil record? The giant spiny anteater (one of the echidna species) is also a slow moving clumsy animal but is supposed to have made it to New Guinea ahead of all the placental mammals.

How is it that Gila monsters got to the American Southwest and why did they not go to the much more convenient deserts near at hand instead? Why did only new world monkeys make it to the new world while no old world monkeys made it? How did armadillos make it across the Atlantic Ocean while wildebeest, zebras and giraffe did not? The question is not only how these animals got where they were going but also why other animals equally well adapted for the destination and in many cases far more able to travel did not.

One ‘explanation I have seen is people took them. I think you will find this one on TrueOrigins. This does not really explain anything. What people? When? Right after the flood there were supposedly only 8 people alive and by the time the population could have regenerated to allow migration of people to other continents most of the animals would have scattered out over a vast range and either established themselves where they are not present now or become extinct, since marsupials don't generally compete very well with placental mammals. How and why did people take these particular animals? Do you really think people took blind marsupial moles, kangaroos, echidna, kiwis, koalas, wombats, the platypus and the marsupial wolf to Australia, New Guinea and New Zealand along with all the other animals unique to the area. How and why did they gather all theses marsupials and leave none behind (except the possum which somehow got to North America) while taking no placental mammals except dogs? Did people bring Gila monsters to the American Southwest and sloths, new world monkeys, jaguars and rattlesnakes to the Americas?

Another other creationist answer I have seen is that these animals got where they were going when a single continent somehow split up post flood to make the current continents of the world. Aside from the geological impossibility of this rapid continent movement it does not solve the problem. How would blind marsupial moles, kiwis, koalas, monotremes and other unique Australian animals get to the southern part of the original single continent to be a carried to Australia while virtually no placental mammals made it? Did Noah give the all the marsupials a magic potion to make them race to the south? How did sloths get to the western part of the super continent to be carried to the Americas while no lions or wildebeest or zebras made it? Why would this continent separation sort new world monkeys from old world monkeys?

The land bridge explanation also fails. First Australia, New Guinea and New Zealand are separated from Indonesia by the very deep water, the so-called Wallace line, so land bridges are highly unlikely. Most importantly, even if land bridges did exist they do not help. How could marsupial moles or other slow moving marsupials get from the Middle East and cross land bridges to Australia while faster moving placental mammals did not? How did sloths make it across land bridges while much faster moving animals did not make it. Do you really think sloths, which cannot survive low temperatures and only travel in trees and Gila monsters, which are desert reptiles crossed an ice age land bridge over the Bering Sea to get to their current habitats?

You can find some information on the Wallace line at http://publish.uwo.ca/~handford/zoog2.html
and on the Brown-throated Three-toed sloth (Bradypus variegatus) at http://bss.sfsu.edu/geog/bholzman/courses/fall99projects/sloth.htm


HELEN
I don't have time to do anything major on this, really, but I must say that, as a YEC, I don't have a problem with where animals ended up. First of all, they had to end up somewhere. Secondly, natural selection would selectagainst them being in locations not favorable to their particular abilities and needs. We do have evidence of some marsupials in south America from what I can recall quickly here, but no longer. Natural selection wiped them out. However, in the isolation of Australia they thrived. They would have gotten there before Australia was split from the Asian landmass.

Why weren't they eaten by predators? Maybe a lot of them were! Why didn't predators follow? Obviously, they didn't need to -- they had plenty of food where they were.

As far as blind moles and such, please consider that blindness there, as with cave fish, could be a later loss of information, not the initial condition. Sloths did not necessarily have to begin as slow animals (not that I picture them galloping...), and I doubt koalas were initially limited to gum tree leaves. In other words, a lot of the arguments here are from evolutionist personal incredulity, and have little or nothing to do with actually asking questions, only with mocking creation and the Bible.


THE BARBARIAN
The question was how to explain it, if they all came off the Ark in South Asia. How did blind marsupial moles make it to Australia ahead of all the placentals?


Why weren't they eaten by predators? Maybe a lot of them were!

Not too many, out of the two that were on the Ark. (Or seven if marsupial moles are clean) That brings up a question, what did all those carnivores eat? If they had such a poor predator/prey ratio, they would have eaten all the prey animals and then starved.

A cat is not going to be supported by just a few prey animals. The predators would have gone through all the herbivores very quickly.

RANDY WICKETT
I don't have time to do anything major on this, really, but I must say that, as a YEC, I don't have a problem with where animals ended up. First of all, they had to end up somewhere.

There is a non-answer if I ever heard one. Your approach here is another that I have often seen. You try to answer how some of the animals may have gotten where they are, even if very incompletely, and ignore the problem of why other, better traveling animals that exploit the same types enivronments did not travel with them.


However, in the isolation of Australia they thrived. They would have gotten there before Australia was split from the Asian landmass.

But how would they get to the isolation of Australia in isolation? They are there because they evolved there in isolation not because they came off an ark in the middle east with representatives of all the other animals in the world and somehow outraced them to the south just in time to be rescued from competition by a magic continent split.


Why weren't they eaten by predators? Maybe a lot of them were! Why didn't predators follow?
Obviously, they didn't need to -- they had plenty of food where they were.

Plenty of food! Just what food was that? Animals mix by habitat. The marsupial grazers would mix with placental grazers and the predators of both types that feed on grazing animals would follow them. Of course the problem of what predators ate post ark is another one that is insoluble for YECs but that is the subject for another thread.

I am NOT mocking the Bible. I do believe that many of the old testament stories are not literally true. How is that mocking? Perhaps I am a bit mocking about some creationist claims because they do indeed seem absurd to me. If so I am sorry but the fact remains that you have not and can't answer this question. Ad hoc musings about omnivorous koalas and faster moving sloths don't explain why only and nearly all maruspials got to places where they exist in the fossil record and why often faster moving placental mammals did not make it. They do not explain the sorting of old and new world monkeys for example, or any of the other facts of the world's biogeography. The people who recorded the flood myth had no idea how many different species of animals exist around the world in unique locations. I am sure they did not envision Noah taking two members of the kangaroo 'kind' on the ark. Their ignorance is understandable and should not be mocked but that does not mean that their myth should be accepted as fact by people today who know what the wider world is actually like.


HRG/ALTER EGO
IOW, for the time immediately after your Flood, you propose hyperevolution at rates which have never been observed.


HELEN
The concept of 'hyper-speciation' has long been recognized as being not only possible but probable when ecological niches are empty. Lizards in the Bahamas, introduced to islands where they had not been before and where there was a niche showed in fourteen years the sorts of variations which could easily cause taxonomic classification into different species. Studies with guppies show that within a generation or two the presence of predators influences the brightness of color in the males. We can see from 'ring species' that variations and geography have a great deal to do with breeding and markings. All this is the same 'hyper-speciation' that happened after the Ark. We certainly have done more than that with dogs and intentional breeding practices in just a few hundred years! So just from out own experience in a crowded world, the mocking about 'hyper-speciation' is an ignorant one. Yes, it can happen and yes, it does happen.

As far as incredulity due to modern knowledge of biology, that is probably the first and main reason I am a creationist! There is NOTHING that we know of in biology at all which would allow one sort of life form, such as a fish, to become another sort, such as an amphibian. There is no known method except the extrapolations which exist only in the imaginations of evolution-believers. Variations we see. Basic change we don't. That is biology as she are spoke and operates.

Now, about food supply coming off the Ark -- first of all, the Bible is clear about no meat eating before the Flood. It was not part of the animal world. So there would be an initial search for vegetation after the Flood by all and only when the proper supplies of the proper foods could not be obtained would the predator-prey relationships be established. Consider also that rodents of all kinds could care less about whether it is dark or light when they breed. If it is relatively warm and there is a food supply, they are off and running.

A number of years ago we raised a gopher snake from a hatchling. When he was big enough we bought feeder mice from the local pet store once a week for him. One spring, when he was about four feet long and quite mature, he got the mating urge and preferred banging his head on the cage screen rather than eating. So I pulled out the mice and waiting a week, introduced them again. Charlie still wasn't hungry. In a couple of months I had thirty-two mice. We shoved Charlie down a gopher-hole with 'good luck, old boy' and took care of the mice. I would HATE to think how many mice would have been possible in a year. Add to that rats, rabbits, etc., and you have quite a crowd coming OFF the Ark! The predators, on the other hand, have much longer generation times and thus fewer offspring, by far, for any given length of time. So there was plenty to eat for the meat-eaters from the get-go.

Especially considering that the prey animals had not been chased and eaten before and running away from predators was an instinct that had to kick in.

Nor was it a non-answer that everything had to end up somewhere. That is simply the way it is. A pair or two of kangaroos simply could NOT 'spread out everywhere'! So where they went was where kangaroos ended up!
There's no other way around that -- it's simple and logical.

There was also several hundred years for these migrations, by moles or otherwise, before the largest mountain chains arose and the continents started breaking up in a serious fashion. The earth was divided in the days of Peleg (Genesis 10:25) and that was four or five human generations after the flood. The animals had plenty of time to disperse, vary, and fill local niches all over the world.

The argument was made that animals mix by habitat so the marsupials would be with placentals of the same food preference. No, not necessarily. Once a niche is full, competing populations die out or move on. Moving on was quite acceptable as the habitat 'over there' was still quite empty. I don't think the Bible mockers and 'interpreters' here have the picture of what life was like after the Flood.

It would have been warm and humid. Shallow lakes and marshes would have been plentiful. Vegetation would have grown quickly. Areas between marshes and lakes would have been the natural migrating pathways for the animals, so there would have been some 'direction' to their movements once started in any particular direction. It's important NOT to see the world of today as being representative of the world after the Flood. It isn't. The deserts and high mountains came later. Conditions were ripe for both migration and speciation, and that is exactly what happened. It was not a question of any group 'out-racing' any other group of animals; it was simply a matter of which direction the off-loaded pair or population took off in, in the first place.


HRG/ALTER EGO
As far as incredulity due to modern knowledge of biology, that is probably the first and main reason I am a creationist! There is NOTHING that we know of in biology at all which would allow one sort of life form, such as a fish, to become another sort, such as an amphibian.

But those are the same sort: vertebrates, aren't they ?
You might recall that amphibians are descended from sarcopterygii, not from teleosts.
You might also recall that, within vertebrates, the synapsid-to-mammals transition has been observed (indirectly - just as the magnetic field of the sun has been observed).


HELEN
Here, HRG -- read this first, OK? http://www.trueorigin.org/therapsd.asp


RANDY WICKETT
Now, about food supply coming off the Ark -- first of all, the Bible is clear about no meat eating before the Flood. It was not part of the animal world. So there would be an initial search for vegetation after the Flood by all and only when the proper supplies of the proper foods could not be obtained would the predator-prey relationships be established.

You make the claim, based on your particular interpretation of a few Bible verses, that lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, velociraptors, t-rexes, sharks, eagles, hawks, saber tooth tigers, and all the thousands and thousands of other species that are clearly adapted for predation were vegetarians before the flood and then complain that you think people are mocking your views. Amazing! BTW I think there is pretty clear evidence for predation in the supposedly flood deposited fossil record. Maybe this discussion belongs on another thread.


Consider also that rodents of all kinds could care less about whether it is dark or light when they breed. If it is relatively warm and there is a food supply, they are off and running…

Do you think lions could or would live by hunting mice and rabbits? Lions and other large predators hunt large prey and in your version of the story every time a lion, leopard, cheetah, velociraptor, t-rex, saber tooth tiger, thalcine or any other of the thousands of extant or extinct predators comes off the ark and eats any unclean animal before it has produced offspring (remember you also claim that some animals were brought on as juveniles) that whole genus or perhaps whole familiy disappears forever. Your claim about prey animals not running away at first just makes the situation worse.


Nor was it a non-answer that everything had to end up somewhere. That is simply the way it is. A pair or two of kangaroos simply could NOT 'spread out everywhere'! So where they went was where kangaroos ended up! There's no other way around that -- it's simple and logical.

We are not talking about a single pair of kangaroos. We are talking about at least 13 distinct families of marsupials that live in a wide variety of habitats, including mole-like animals, in addition to monotremes and other unique animals all staying together and moving a great distance to an area large enough to form Australia, New Zealand and New Guinea with virtually no placental mammals mixing in. How logical is that?

I am not mocking the Bible. I am just pointing out that your twisting of the facts of biology to try to fit your particular intrepretation of the Bible makes no sense. This is not the way ecology works. Do you think that placental grazing animals could not compete with marsupial grazers and thus didn't move to the part of the continent that became Australia? Do you see only one species of grazing animal and only one species of predator on the plains of Africa?


It would have been warm and humid. Shallow lakes and marshes would have been plentiful. Vegetation would have grown quickly. Areas between marshes and lakes would have been the natural migrating pathways for the animals, so there would have been some 'direction' to their movements once started in any particular direction. It's important NOT to see the world of today as being representative of the world after the Flood. It isn't. The deserts and high mountains came later.

So how did desert animals live? Did they all hyperevolve from swamp dwellers a few hundred years after the flood?
You get futher and further out on a limb with each attempt to fit the facts to your Biblical interpretation.


Conditions were ripe for both migration and speciation, and that is exactly what happened. It was not a question of any group 'out-racing' any other group of animals; it was simply a matter of which direction the off-loaded pair or population took off in, in the first place.

And you claim that all the those marsupials, monotremes and flightless birds that went to Australia, New Guinea and New Zealand just happened to take off in the direction of the part of the world where they existed in the fossil record and no placentals came along to either exploit the same habitiats or prey on those marsupials momotremes and flightless birds. How can you consider this a logical explanation?


DAVEW
Helen, the True Origins article you linked to seems to me to be pretty much the usual combination of quote-mining and pointing out that science isn't 100% certain.

Speaking of quote mining, I saw this quote from Camp in the article:

"Morganucodontids (about four inches long to tail base) do indeed have a number of mammalian skeletal features, but they also have a fully-functional reptilian jaw joint (quadrate-articular) which distinguishes them from all living mammals."

So what's the creationist explanation for creatures that have mammalian skeletal features and reptilian jaw joints?
Are mammals and reptiles part of a single created "kind"?

Please note, I'm not asking for evidence supporting the creationist position (Camp claims there's no evidence of such an evolutionary transition, and may be right). I'm just asking what hypothesis has been put forth by creationists to explain a creature that has both mammalian and reptilian characteristics.

[Administrator: the platypus is considered a mosaic form. Why not the Morganucodontids?]