Isn't it reasonable to doubt Young Earth Creationism?

iouae

Well-known member
As I said, we prefer to deal with reality. There is matter. The only way for gravity to be the same everywhere is for matter to be infinite.

Your analysis is flawed.

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This is like discussing supercritical water, I am supercritical that this has any relevance.

If the universe is symmetrical in all directions from where one is in the universe, then on average, gravity is equal in all directions from all points.

And every place in the universe, is equidistant from the edge of the universe, meaning every point is in the middle of the universe.

But this is a side-track. Explain why light does not get faster as Voyager gets further away from the pull of our sun.
 

iouae

Well-known member
On the contrary... it is you who attempts to prove God wrong.
It depends on several things? For starters... How long did it take God to spread the stars? Did God create the one way speed of light to be almost instantaneous? Was the speed of light trillions of times faster in the past as some secular astronomers speculate?https://cosmosmagazine.com/physics/was-the-speed-of-light-faster-at-the-beginning-of-the-universe (You presume a lot of things in order to come up with your false conclusions)
True... But your beliefs are false. Creation was a miracle. (Its in the Bible)
As others have told you... there is no date sticker on light, nor on fossils. Your interpretation is meant to fit a secular belief system. Science (fossils, distant galaxies etc.)helps confirm the truth of God's Word. In the beginning God created...in six days, He created the heavens and the earth, and everything in them.

Your choo choo jumped the track with that last sentence. Are there date stickers on all that God created saying created Day 4, expires Day 7.

On the contrary, there ARE date stickers on light - we know exactly how fast it travels, therefore how far its come, therefore, how long its been around - from the speed of light which is a constant c.

And all the questions you pose as we don't know this, and we don't know that and the jury is still out on this - are just typical YEC excuses which actually mean we (regular scientists) DO know, but y'all don't want to acknowledge it.

And when it comes to fossils, when one finds community after different community buried on top of one another with never the twain mixing - then at the very least you know there were different communities at different times - which blows YEC out of the water bigly, since YEC says all creatures which ever lived, lived together. Wrong.
 

6days

New member
iouae said:
we know exactly how fast it (light] travels, therefore how far its come, therefore, how long its been around - from the speed of light which is a constant c.
You are partially correct. Yes, we can measure distance and speed. No, you don't have a time machine to see how God created, nor the conditions at that time.

However we do have His Word telling us humanity was there from a time near the foundation of the world... and from the beginning. You can read about "the beginning" in Genesis 1.


I'm off to Cuba again. Reading suggestion while I'm gone... Study words of Jesus and what He taught about creation, and understanding the Torah. And... if you have time read words of various Bible authors to see how the first few chapters of Genesis is the foundation of the Gospel.
 

Derf

Well-known member
I'm pretty partial to this idea on how God stretched out the heavens...

https://answersingenesis.org/astron...ew-solution-to-the-light-travel-time-problem/

Maybe. I saw a pretty good paper (can't find it right now--will keep looking) that suggested the stretching itself might alter the speed of light, which sounds a bit like what Faulkner is proposing, except Faulkner still appeals to miracle.

Appeals to miracle are not necessarily wrong in my estimation, but it shuts down the conversation. Once an appeal to miracle is made, there's little we can do to figure out how it happened--we can't test for miracle states.

This is a little different from proposing different physics (like faster light in a stretching universe, or early moments of the big bang). These things, while they might be fantastical, at least give us a way to discuss them and achieve some semblance of understanding--based on a premise that might be hard to test, but still possible, we hope.

I did appreciate Faulkner's subtle criticism of Lysle's synchronicity convention: "It is amazing to me that this very interesting solution has not received more attention, particularly of the negative type."
 
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JudgeRightly

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Maybe. I saw a pretty good paper (can't find it right now--will keep looking) that suggested the stretching itself might alter the speed of light, which sounds a bit like what Faulkner is proposing, except Faulkner still appeals to miracle.

Appeals to miracle are not necessarily wrong in my estimation, but it shuts down the conversation. Once an appeal to miracle is made, there's little we can do to figure out how it happened--we can't test for miracle states.

This is a little different from proposing different physics (like faster light in a stretching universe, or early moments of the big bang). These things, while they might be fantastical, at least give us a way to discuss them and achieve some semblance of understanding--based on a premise that might be hard to test, but still possible, we hope.

I did appreciate Faulkner's subtle criticism of Lysle's synchronicity convention: "It is amazing to me that this very interesting solution has not received more attention, particularly of the negative type."
Well, when talking about the creation and forming of an entire universe, we're pretty mich talking about God doing things that no man could ever conceive of, let alone do.
 

JudgeRightly

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Well, when talking about the creation and forming of an entire universe, we're pretty mich talking about God doing things that no man could ever conceive of, let alone do.
Yet we can still discuss things that happened during those miracles, or whatever you want to call them.
 

Derf

Well-known member
Would you agree it isn't really a problem? As Christians we know that God created stars on the 4th day and apparently Adam could see them two days Later. We dont have to know how God brought starlight to earth so fast. (Just like we don't need to many details from the creation week). It could be God created the one way speed of light to be almost instantaneous (a 'convention' as Einstein called it)...it could be perhaps answered with the speed at which God spread the heavens. (Or, the 'problem' may have other answers).

Depends on what you mean by "problem". There is a certain glory in finding out how God does things that we currently don't understand. And there is joy in seeing His revelation upheld by unbelievers as true. I look forward to that in the light travel problem.

I think the one-way speed of light "convention" is an answer isn't really an answer. It is a subtle appeal to miracle without any explanation. And, as I said in my previous post to JudgeRightly, appeals to miracles shut down exploration and research.
 

Idolater

"Foundation of the World" Dispensationalist χρ
When I read that it took God six days to create the heavens and the earth, I take it literally.

When those who don't believe He created everything in six days read 'six days,' they don't take it literally.

So when science tells us that everything looks to be over 13 billion years old, those who don't take 'six days' literally think, "See? 'Told you."

And then when you proffer my position, that everything appears to be older than it actually is, these people think, "Then God is deceiving us in making things look older than they are."

But no. I take 'six days' literally. I would argue that if everything actually is over 13 billion years old, then and only then is God deceiving us, because He said 'six days.'
 

Derf

Well-known member
Well, when talking about the creation and forming of an entire universe, we're pretty mich talking about God doing things that no man could ever conceive of, let alone do.

Yet we can still discuss things that happened during those miracles, or whatever you want to call them.

But where is that line to be drawn? Do we draw it now, before we know what we can conceive of, let alone do?

God made an interesting statement in the Tower of Babel story: [Gen 11:6 KJV] And the LORD said, Behold, the people [is] one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

The conception might still be constrained, but the doing doesn't seem to be. And the concern God voices is likely that the conception isn't constrained very much. In the Babel case, the use is likely to be for evil. In our case, it could also be, and maybe God will shut us down again if we start to go too far.
 

Derf

Well-known member
That's the thing Derf, there are no other factors that I know of which can affect the speed of light coming from distant galaxies, thus in the absence of any good science suggesting the opposite, we have to take as FACT that the light HAS come straight from distant galaxies, at c, the speed of light, which has no good science suggesting that it varies in a vacuum, even when there is or is no gravity.

We cannot use the argument "it's still open for debate" when all science is on the side of "It's already decided".

Fundamentally it stays the same. We have past civilisation built upon past civilisation just like we find in ancient cities like Jericho or Jerusalem, with the oldest at the bottom.
Yes, indeed, that's true except where it isn't. Sometimes someone or something is buried from one timeframe down into another timeframe, just like extreme upheaval or orogeny can disturb layers. And sometimes we just interpret those mounds of ruins incorrectly. Archeology is a great example of a science that has over and over again had to bow to the prescient knowledge contained in the bible.

The big assumption, which is regularly shown to be a poor one, is that the geologic processes we see today are the only ones that should be considered in interpreting the geologic column. We don't see planets forming today. We don't see large chunks of material being exploded off planets to make moons, today. And we don't see worldwide floods today. The latter two theories are from the opposing camps, but both are antithetical to the idea proposed by Lyell that drives the interpretation of the geologic column.

But as I say that, you have to realize that we ARE seeing a lot of stuff today that supports the idea of catastrophe being the major factor in the construction of the geologic column, and that mitigates the need and the evidence for the deep time supposedly "written" in the geo. column.
Our theology is more often than not wrong. There is a greater chance of our theology being wrong than the science being wrong. In this case its definitely the YEC theology which needs tweaking.



"If we can interpret it correctly" are the operative words.

But at least you sound reasonable, so nice to discuss the issue with you.
Yes, those are the operative words, for both general and special revelation.

I think it's pretty naive to assume a lot of "it's already decided" on the science side, especially when we are merely viewing photons through telescopes. There have been lots of new discoveries that invalidated old "already decided" science.

PS. Thank you for the kind words. I've found your posts, though I don't agree with them a lot, to be thoughtful and well-written much of the time.

My reasonableness, on the other hand, ebbs and flows. :)
 

iouae

Well-known member
Yes, indeed, that's true except where it isn't. Sometimes someone or something is buried from one timeframe down into another timeframe, just like extreme upheaval or orogeny can disturb layers. And sometimes we just interpret those mounds of ruins incorrectly. Archeology is a great example of a science that has over and over again had to bow to the prescient knowledge contained in the bible.

The big assumption, which is regularly shown to be a poor one, is that the geologic processes we see today are the only ones that should be considered in interpreting the geologic column. We don't see planets forming today. We don't see large chunks of material being exploded off planets to make moons, today. And we don't see worldwide floods today. The latter two theories are from the opposing camps, but both are antithetical to the idea proposed by Lyell that drives the interpretation of the geologic column.

But as I say that, you have to realize that we ARE seeing a lot of stuff today that supports the idea of catastrophe being the major factor in the construction of the geologic column, and that mitigates the need and the evidence for the deep time supposedly "written" in the geo. column.

Yes, those are the operative words, for both general and special revelation.

I think it's pretty naive to assume a lot of "it's already decided" on the science side, especially when we are merely viewing photons through telescopes. There have been lots of new discoveries that invalidated old "already decided" science.

PS. Thank you for the kind words. I've found your posts, though I don't agree with them a lot, to be thoughtful and well-written much of the time.

My reasonableness, on the other hand, ebbs and flows. :)

Well thank you for your reasonableness being in flow mode :)

I too believe mostly in catastrophes being primarily responsible for the geologic column, but that there are many iterations written in the rocks, of which the Biblical flood is just the latest one.

I take Genesis 1:1 saying that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Much happened. The earth then was left, after all that we see in the geologic column, and after endless biomes, one after the other, "without form and void". Time for a new iteration, the age of man. So the Spirit of God hovers over the waters, and in day 1 of the recreation, God says "let there be light". And sunlight, which was there all along, manages to penetrate to the surface of the waters (oceans) as God clears the nuclear winter type conditions of darkness covering the earth before day 1.

So I definitely believe some catastrophe had left the world "without form and void" but 500 million years after life had originally been created on earth in the Pre-Cambrian. There probably were photosynthetic microbes 3000Ma (million years ago). The Bible does not pretend to tell us what happened in the ancient past, just as it tells us very little about what will happen in the distant future - what we will do for all eternity, for instance.

The Bible does tell us that at Christ's return there will be stuff falling from space which will lead to a mass extinction of mankind, and that after the Millennium there will be a new heavens and new earth - all of which too will leave their marks on the geologic column.
 

iouae

Well-known member
When I read that it took God six days to create the heavens and the earth, I take it literally.

When those who don't believe He created everything in six days read 'six days,' they don't take it literally.

So when science tells us that everything looks to be over 13 billion years old, those who don't take 'six days' literally think, "See? 'Told you."

And then when you proffer my position, that everything appears to be older than it actually is, these people think, "Then God is deceiving us in making things look older than they are."

But no. I take 'six days' literally. I would argue that if everything actually is over 13 billion years old, then and only then is God deceiving us, because He said 'six days.'

Let's take it that God is not in the deceiving business. Also, He is not in the explaining everything business.

Let's take it that God DID do something in 6 days, and that Usher is correct in his generations count, and that what God DID do in 6 days was to create conditions suitable for mankind, and on day 6 create modern Homo sapiens. And lets take it that science might be right, because it too is not in the deceiving business, neither is it in the explaining everything business. The universe may have been formed 13 billion years ago by God, but called by us The Big Bang. Modern human civilisation does not go back much beyond 6000 years to Sumer on the Tigris and Euphrates.
 

Derf

Well-known member
Well thank you for your reasonableness being in flow mode :)

I too believe mostly in catastrophes being primarily responsible for the geologic column, but that there are many iterations written in the rocks, of which the Biblical flood is just the latest one.

I take Genesis 1:1 saying that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Much happened. The earth then was left, after all that we see in the geologic column, and after endless biomes, one after the other, "without form and void". Time for a new iteration, the age of man. So the Spirit of God hovers over the waters, and in day 1 of the recreation, God says "let there be light". And sunlight, which was there all along, manages to penetrate to the surface of the waters (oceans) as God clears the nuclear winter type conditions of darkness covering the earth before day 1.

So I definitely believe some catastrophe had left the world "without form and void" but 500 million years after life had originally been created on earth in the Pre-Cambrian. There probably were photosynthetic microbes 3000Ma (million years ago). The Bible does not pretend to tell us what happened in the ancient past, just as it tells us very little about what will happen in the distant future - what we will do for all eternity, for instance.

The Bible does tell us that at Christ's return there will be stuff falling from space which will lead to a mass extinction of mankind, and that after the Millennium there will be a new heavens and new earth - all of which too will leave their marks on the geologic column.

I don't think your view is consistent with Moses'. He said:
[Exo 20:11 YLT] for six days hath Jehovah made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that [is] in them, and resteth in the seventh day; therefore hath Jehovah blessed the Sabbath-day, and doth sanctify it.

In your scenario, Ex 20:11 requires that the catastrophes include the heavens, because He "made" everything that is in the heavens in the space of those six days just as He also made man--so whatever caused multiple extinctions on the earth, were also affecting all of the stars. Can you imagine an effect that disturbs stars so far distant from us and from each other that also allows some creatures to survive on the earth?
 

Idolater

"Foundation of the World" Dispensationalist χρ
Let's take it that God is not in the deceiving business. Also, He is not in the explaining everything business.

Let's take it that God DID do something in 6 days, and that Usher is correct in his generations count, and that what God DID do in 6 days was to create conditions suitable for mankind, and on day 6 create modern Homo sapiens. And lets take it that science might be right, because it too is not in the deceiving business, neither is it in the explaining everything business. The universe may have been formed 13 billion years ago by God, but called by us The Big Bang.
Then God is deceiving us, because He told us He took six days, and not six billion, years. Plus seven billion more.

You can take 'six days' figuratively, or poetically, or rhetorically. I have no issue with people who do, with one exception. When I suggest that the universe appears to be over 13 billion years old, but 'six days' is the reality, they think my view has me making God deceptive---and that's ONLY true, if everything's actually over 13 billion years old. If the age of the universe's closer to 'six days' old, than to 13 billion years old, then there's no deception at all on God's part.
Modern human civilisation does not go back much beyond 6000 years to Sumer on the Tigris and Euphrates.
If Adam was created already able to speak proto-language, then that would look, historically, a lot like quote-unquote "humans inventing language for the first time, and it then spreading like wildfire," with a step-change in historical records happening, yes, sometime around <10,000 years ago.
 

iouae

Well-known member
I don't think your view is consistent with Moses'. He said:
[Exo 20:11 YLT] for six days hath Jehovah made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that [is] in them, and resteth in the seventh day; therefore hath Jehovah blessed the Sabbath-day, and doth sanctify it.

In your scenario, Ex 20:11 requires that the catastrophes include the heavens, because He "made" everything that is in the heavens in the space of those six days just as He also made man--so whatever caused multiple extinctions on the earth, were also affecting all of the stars. Can you imagine an effect that disturbs stars so far distant from us and from each other that also allows some creatures to survive on the earth?

When you can see that God DID make the heaven(s) and the earth in 6 days - then you truly will be free.

But God making the heaven(s) and earth is LIMITED TO EARTH'S HEAVEN (SKY), EARTH, AND SEAS.

It is not speaking about God making the cosmos.

What heresy is this you ask?

Well read Genesis - anything there about Jupiter, Alpha Centauri, the Big Bang. No!

I tried caps, in case you missed it. It's all about the three layers of the earth, atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere.

But, what about day 4 when God sets the sun, moon and stars for signs you may ask. Just as after the flood God set the rainbow for a covenant, that does not mean there were no rainbows before Noah. God is appointing them for signs and seasons, meaning for Holy Days. Imagine an earth Day 1-3 without the sun. How would you be able to tell the day without the sun? You could not. The sun was there before day 4. In fact, on Day 1 God clears the atmosphere enough so that "Let there be light" and there was light, from the point of view of where the Holy Spirit was hovering, on the surface of the oceans.

So God did make the heavens (atmosphere) and the earth (lithosphere) and the seas (hydrosphere) and all that in them dwell in 6 days. But for the last 500 million years, other biomes had existed with mass extinction after mass extinction burying them, and leaving the geologic column.

By day 4 God had cleared the atmosphere sufficiently that the sun, moon and stars could shine through and be appointed for signs and seasons, for mankind soon to be created. But day 4 makes sense when seen we are limiting what is happening to earth. From an earthly perspective (where the Holy Spirit hovers) the heavens can be seen.

On each day we see God do something TO EARTH e.g.. making sea animals, land animals, sky animals, humans, plants - all stuff happening on earth, NOT THE COSMOS.
 

iouae

Well-known member
If Adam was created already able to speak proto-language, then that would look, historically, a lot like quote-unquote "humans inventing language for the first time, and it then spreading like wildfire," with a step-change in historical records happening, yes, sometime around <10,000 years ago.

Culture DID burst into existence in Sumer, thus proving the Genesis account.

The fact that Homo sapiens civilisation seems to burst on the scene (Holocene) proves that God is hiding nothing, nor trying to deceive, since God gave Adam and Eve culture all at once. They were created with language, and obviously shown stuff by God.
 
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Derf

Well-known member
When you can see that God DID make the heaven(s) and the earth in 6 days - then you truly will be free.

But God making the heaven(s) and earth is LIMITED TO EARTH'S HEAVEN (SKY), EARTH, AND SEAS.

It is not speaking about God making the cosmos.

What heresy is this you ask?

Well read Genesis - anything there about Jupiter, Alpha Centauri, the Big Bang. No!

I tried caps, in case you missed it. It's all about the three layers of the earth, atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere.

But, what about day 4 when God sets the sun, moon and stars for signs you may ask. Just as after the flood God set the rainbow for a covenant, that does not mean there were no rainbows before Noah. God is appointing them for signs and seasons, meaning for Holy Days. Imagine an earth Day 1-3 without the sun. How would you be able to tell the day without the sun? You could not. The sun was there before day 4. In fact, on Day 1 God clears the atmosphere enough so that "Let there be light" and there was light, from the point of view of where the Holy Spirit was hovering, on the surface of the oceans.

So God did make the heavens (atmosphere) and the earth (lithosphere) and the seas (hydrosphere) and all that in them dwell in 6 days. But for the last 500 million years, other biomes had existed with mass extinction after mass extinction burying them, and leaving the geologic column.

By day 4 God had cleared the atmosphere sufficiently that the sun, moon and stars could shine through and be appointed for signs and seasons, for mankind soon to be created. But day 4 makes sense when seen we are limiting what is happening to earth. From an earthly perspective (where the Holy Spirit hovers) the heavens can be seen.

On each day we see God do something TO EARTH e.g.. making sea animals, land animals, sky animals, humans, plants - all stuff happening on earth, NOT THE COSMOS.

Paul gives us a limited idea of what "heavens" means when he says he was caught up to the third heaven:
[2Co 12:2 KJV] I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth) such an one caught up to the third heaven.
[2Co 12:4 KJV] How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.


Genesis 1 gives us the idea that there are multiple heavens, and stars are in "heaven" as well as birds. Birds might also be considered to fly on the "surface" or "face" of heaven. And some translations say "heavens" explicitly.
[Gen 1:6 KJV] And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
[Gen 1:8 KJV] And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
[Gen 1:14 KJV] And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
[Gen 1:16 KJV] And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: [he made] the stars also.
[Gen 1:20 KJV] And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl [that] may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.


It's reasonable to conclude that if there are only 3 heavens, and the third is where God's paradise is, then the 1st heaven is the sky (the atmosphere, as you mentioned), and the second heaven is not defined, but is somewhere between the 1st and 3rd. If the sky does NOT have stars in it, then the firmament, where the stars are, is a great candidate for the 2nd heaven.

I suppose God could be excluding the second heaven from His "heavens" in Ex 20:11, but then, if He really meant a plural "heavens" that means He made the place where His paradise is currently located, as well as the atmosphere in seven days, but NOT the stars. So now you have some kind of cataclysm that destroyed both the earth and the sky and the third heaven, but not the second heaven. If the layers of the heavens are sequential, then it seems odd to have the second layer left intact, but the third and first destroyed. A more plausible scenario, if one needs to omit one of the heavens, is that the third heaven was not destroyed.

But the Ex 20 passage, with its reference to the six days of creation, is clearly referring back to Gen 1, and just as clearly including multiple heavens. So any cataclysm must include the heaven where stars are.

Let me ask you this: Are crocodiles part of what God made in the 6 days of Ex 20? What about coelacanth? Or sharks and rays? Wollemi Pine? Insects? Flowering plants?

Did ANYTHING survive from before Genesis 1:2?
 
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