Best Evidence For and Against A Young Earth?

Question:: 
I was recently asked the following on a creationist blog I was invited to read. >>> Healyhatman if there had been a world-wide flood what evidence would you expect to see? What is your best-specific- piece of evidence against a young earth? <<< I made a huge list of the things I thought I would expect to see and added radio-isotope dating / stars more than 6k light years away as answers for the second part. But what are the big pieces of evidence one would expect for a global flood, and what is the single best piece of evidence against a young earth? Which piece of evidence "rules them all" ? Also, why aren't line breaks working? http://sydneyanglicanheretics.blogspot.com/2008/06/k-d-creation-of-world-part-4.html
Atheist Answer: 

Line breaks aren't working for you because the formatting in the answers isn't implemented for the question field (hint hint, powers that be).

As usual I'm going to be very general here because I am not a scientist, but I will try to include key points you can google later.

The number one method young-Earth creationists use to make a young earth plausible in light of geological and paleontological realities is to exploit the most catastrophic world-changing event in the Bible set chronologically between Creation and Armageddon: Noah's flood. This is the raison d'etre of so-called flood geology.

The flood, they claim, carved out the Grand Canyon, wiped out all of the animals we only see today as fossils, and laid down all the strata in quick succession as sediment.
To put it mildly, there are a multitude of potential problems with this.

One is the rigid position of all animals worldwide in the strata. In the chaos of a planet overwhelmed by rushing water, why are all specimens in a given extinct species (say, trilobites) found in the same layer instead of all over the place?

There's one clever explanation that simple animals were drowned first, followed by successively more advanced animals who could fly or were more agile. So the higher they are the longer they held on, and the more evolved they "appear". However you'd expect millions of exceptions to this, for example a small reptile holding onto a floating log. There are many claims of objects found out of sequence, like petrified trees penetrating many strata, but no proven anomalies yet.

Radiocarbon dating is the most straightforward method of disproving the young earth. Using basic laws of nuclear physics, it regularly establishes the age of objects as tens of thousands to millions of years old. Even one such object would prove the earth to be least that old, but this happens all the dang time.

Therefore, of course, there's a huge effort by creationists to discredit radiocarbon dating completely and utterly. There are large margins of error sometimes, but when you're only trying to make sure something is older than six millennia, an error of millions of years out of greater millions hardly matters.

What many don't know is that there are many different forms of dating, based in principle on the initial carbon method but using other particles. Some of these have indeed been found unreliable and are no longer in use (and are publicised by some creationists to represent the whole field as a failure) but this does not reflect upon the methods still used.

Similar to this geological argument between young-earth creationists and everybody else is the astronomical argument. There are objects greater than 6000 light years away, such that if the universe were that young, light from them wouldn't have reached us yet.

One creationist has developed a bigger cousin to flood geology, namely white hole cosmology. WHC assigns different time speeds to different areas, so that six thousand years here is billions of years at the edge of the universe. Besides WHC, there are other ideas involving light moving faster than the speed of light itself. Needless to say, these ideas as applied in this way are without support in mainstream science.

The first thing I'd throw at them in your situation, Healy, is those distant objects in space. White hole cosmology isn't nearly as well-rehearsed as flood geology, and the responses tend to sound really cool in a sci-fi B-movie sort of way. It might be fun. Either that, or they might concede an old universe and concentrate on a young Earth, which is not a very stable position.

- SmartLX

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I heard of WHC and found it

I heard of WHC and found it to be rather amusing personally.

The creationists sent me off to a bunch of pro-creationist websites about how the fossils aren't really in order, briefly mentioned sorting mechanisms to explain why they are, things like that. It's a little bit messy really.

"...what are the big pieces of evidence one would expect for a global flood"

By this I meant what would the geological evidence look like for a global flood, ignoring for the moment that the water had to come from somewhere and had to disappear somewhere.

As always though, thanks for the response ^^

The flood

There are plenty of Christian answers to the problem of water conservation. Here are a few. Since this was a direct intervention by God, "God did it" is a satisfactory answer to believers by itself, and all of the others are variations of it with bits of bonus geology.

What would real evidence for the flood look like? I don't know exactly, because there's never been one like it. Water fast and deep enough to erode the Grand Canyon in 40 days would have left a similarly enormous aftermath all over the world, not just in particular places.

Fish, plankton, bacteria and everything else which can survive in seawater would have been distributed far and wide. Specimens of single species, even those with poor mobility, would be separated by thousands of miles without ever having lived in between. This doesn't include freshwater creatures, because the salty oceans would have killed them and therefore Noah must have kept them in an aquarium on the Ark.

One other thing would be that everywhere on Earth would show signs of having been underwater at one time. The deserts, the mountains, everywhere. If some mountain peak lacks the signs, then we have an upper limit for the water level and can work down.

You ought to ask a marine biologist this question. You'd get a great answer.

young earth arguments

Forget about out of sequence trilobites and objects more than 6,000 light years away. Can't the YEC's just claim that, since god created it all anyway, he just created some distant objects with their light already reaching us, and created rocks > 6,000 years old ("created with age") as well as just shuffled the trilobites around? The point, I guess, is why discuss these issues with these people anyhoo?

Yes, but...

Yes, they could claim that, and send themselves down a very slippery slope.

If you accept that light can be created in transit and objects can be created "old", why stop at six thousand years? The universe could have been created one microsecond ago, with a prefabricated civilisation, all visible starlight starting just a few hundred feet away, and all of us made at our current ages with brains full of false long-term and short-term memories. Therefore Jesus Christ, who existed before this instant universe, would be nothing but a piece of fake history.

YECs can give God any arbitrary ability or method they like in order to make a young universe possible. This doesn't help them make it plausible, and it certainly doesn't help them establish that it must be the case.

It is certainly worth discussing these issues with YECs. Even if they think of a way around any objection, it's always possible that one of them will realise how badly he or she has had to twist and turn to justify the position, and conclude that it isn't worth it.

what would you expect from a global flood...

I love science. And I use to believe the earth was billions of years old. And one day I listen to a creationist give a presentation on dinosaurs and I have to admit up front that now I believe the earth can't be more then 6 or 7,000 years old. I would love to discuss these arguments for and against the flood with you if you are interested, there is nothing wrong with a friendly debate. We can always "agree to disagree" if it goes too far for you.

I think I answered at least most of the things you and others have said. I look forward to discussing it more. I am sorry it is so long but you had a lot of questions there are 11 points to make.

First I want to answer the question which provoked me to share this with you.
What would you expect to see from a global flood?

I would expect to see continent sized or even global sized erosion patterns from large amounts of moving water, billions of animals laid down in sediment (mud now turned to rock layers) all over the earth (fossil record), Marine life like clams on tops of most or all of the mountains including Mt. Everest, sedimentary (water born) rock covering most of the earth. And lots of water left over (71% of the globe is covered by oceans).

If you so desire I can email you references and pictures of all of the above mentioned. But I didn’t want to take up all the space. Also feel free to research any facts I mention below.

Here are some basic concepts of the global flood that many people are not aware of or don't understand. Also to answer some of the questions you brought up.

1. When animals die today they don’t fossilize they riot and decay. Bacteria and other animals eat it, and it riots back to dust. The only way to get a good fossil is cover it quickly with sediment like dumping concrete in your fish tank. That will give you a fossil fish. But if it just dies it will riot away leaving no fossil. This is true today and in the past.

2. The bible says the flood lasted 371 days (it rained for 40 days, but the water came up for 150 days the rest was the receding of the water off the continents).

A. Most of the water came from underground chambers through the fault lines we see all over the earth today. (the fountains of the great deep burst open it says in scripture)

3. The bible says the mountains arose after the flood (which is what evolutionists call Pangea and continental drift today) thus you didn't have to cover Mount Everest with water because it wasn't there yet. Even evolutionists teach basically all the mountains came up in the very last part of the geologic time scale (the last few million years)

4. This (mountains going up after the flood) also explains where the water went. Mountains came up the water rushed off into the low places we now call oceans. Which explains the continent sized erosion marks all over the U.S. and the world. Also explains the continental shelf that wraps around all the continents. Lastly it explains why every moutain range has thousands of fossil clams on top.

5. If the mountains where lower and oceans basins were higher the earth would be covered 1.5 miles deep with water. The earth now is covered 71% under water. It is still flooded.

6. Water does sort rocks and dirt into layers, and this can be demonstrated with various types of rocks, and dirt in a glass box. Shake it and set it down. It will make many layers in less then a minute or so

7. Animals would be buried in mud (later turning to rock) basically where they live. Deep ocean life (trilobites, jelly fish), shallow ocean life (regular fish) , reptiles, etc up to man who would avoid the water the longest (make shift boats holding on to logs and such). I believe this is why there aren’t many human fossils. Because they would die and riot before they were covered by enough mud to preserve their body.

8. 95% of the entire fossil record consists of marine invertebrates (water going creatures with no backbone like jelly fish). The geologic column gives the impression that we see a gradual progression but this can be demonstrated to be not true. Also the idea that not finding an animal in a certain layer proves when it lived in falsified by the coelacanth fish. According to the G. Column they went extinct before the dinosaurs. And are not found in any layer above that! But they are alive today. Over 200 have been caught and recorded by fishermen, and scientists. So there is no reason to think any animal is extinct because of the Geologic column.
These things are called “living fossils”. There are so many examples of them that evolutionist just ignore the subject all together. There is no answer to that problem. If you just look up “living fossils” you will find hundreds of them.

9. The geologic column itself doesn’t exist anywhere in the world (except in the textbooks). If it did it would be nearly 100 miles deep. The deepest fossils are about 1 to 1.5 miles deep. The deepest hole anyone has every dug is only about 5 miles deep. They take the thickest layers and assume they were at least that thick in the past then put them in a supposed evolutionary order and say that’s what happened. So how do you know what the right order is? By assuming evolution has happened. This is called circular reasoning. Using evolution to put the column in order then using the column as proof for evolution. It’s the same as say’s “evolution is true because evolution is true”. We can deal more with evolution later if you like.

10. It can also be shown that the various layers (really layer remnants) were laid down rapidly. The eruption of Mount St Helens in 1980 laid down hundreds of layers and a huge canyon in 9 hours… literally one day. This has prompted many evolutionists to argue that there were “thousands of floods over millions of years”. Well it’s hard to argue with that because the same stuff could be explained with one big flood. So I won’t pick on that too much.

11. Helium is a byproduct of the decay of uranium and can be used to date a rock. We also know that if you use the rate of helium diffusion from the rock you get consistent dates. So why trust a method (uranium decay) that never gives you the same date when tested more then once? Because it gives dates of millions or billions of years. If the date is wrong just test it again until you get a date you like. This is what they do, It is sad we call that science. When you already know what date you want just write that down and save time and money.
So why not use helium diffusion as a dating method. It works well. . . because it always gives a date less then 7000 years. And that makes it wrong in their mind (evolutionists mind that is).

These are what I would consider the core arguments from the Young earth side. I could give more but I don’t want you to bore you to death. Let’s stick with stuff most scientist (YEC and evolutionist) agree on first.

Your thoughts…

Light travel...

One more thing. I forget to get to the light travel. First things first, the big bang also has a "light travel" problem. It is called the horizon problem. It basically says the temperature through out the universe should have "hot" and "cold" spots but it doesn't. The temp is the same everywhere. And there hasn't been enough time (even 20 billion years) for this to happen (temp be the same all over).

The creationist looks at light travel and consider two assumptions.
1. light has always traveled the same speed
2. time is not a variable.

Dr Humphreys model deals with the time variable (time runs it different speeds in different parts of the universe). Thus earth 6,000 years, far reaches of the universe has the equivalent of billions of years of time.

Other creationist have said simply "light speed" must have been faster in the past.

Either one could be true, and both fit the facts we observe today. But to be honest they could both be wrong. Remember we are standing in the present trying to figure out the past. So something’s will never be proven. How ever both models demonstrate it is possible to have stars billions of "light years" away. with a "young" earth. Time is not a substance you can measure; we just use facts to make our best guess.

Again the big bang has the exact same problem as well. So you can't say one is better when they have exactly the same problem. Evolutionists are working to solve this problem but they don't have a working model yet. please research the "horizon problem" for more info.

Good stuff.

Thanks Jeremy, your posts forced me to do some research and educate myself further. That's what I'm after: arguments to which there is not a widely known answer. With everything else I'm treading old ground, though that's what I have to do if the discredited arguments keep coming up.

I'll answer the horizon problem first and come back to the rest later.

Evolutionists are not working on ways to solve the horizon problem, because it's not in their field at all. It concerns me that you, like many creationists, seem to classify anyone in a field which contradicts Biblical Creation (archaeologists, geologists, physicists, cosmologists) as an "evolutionist", lumping all your opponents together. True, those in the above fields generally do accept evolution, but only biologists and zoologists actually approach these issues using it. Evolution is not a cover-all anti-Bible theory. It sticks to life-related matters.

Anyway, the first thing I found when I looked up the horizon problem is its cosmological solution, inflationary theory. It suggests that the early universe expanded exponentially for a period, in response to negative-pressure vacuum energy. This means that the whole observable universe originated in a relatively small, relatively connected area where heat and energy were able to redistribute relatively freely and even themselves out. This explains the homogeneity we see when we look out there.

To investigate your alternative hypothesis, I looked up your Dr Russell Humphreys (who at different times has been the go-to scientist for at least four major "creation science" organisations). As it says in the link, his model of the universe rests on a great many conclusions of his, all of which other scientists have challenged or outright dismissed: everything from sodium in the sea to underground zircons to the Kuiper Belt to the speed of light. This man's work has zero support outside of young-earth creationists. Even the old-earth creationists are against him. That doesn't mean by itself that he's wrong, of course, but it does mean there are some ready-made reasons stated by other scientists why his conclusions are.

The main point I want to press about his model, however, is that it only explains one thing: how, with the universe looking the way it does to us, it could possibly be less than 10^4 years old. That's not the case with the inflationary theory. It doesn't just solve the horizon problem, it also takes care of the flatness problem (related to the initial conditions and future expansion of the universe) and the lesser-known magnetic monopole problem (i.e. why there aren't any magnetic monopoles). It's a far-reaching explanation supported by already-accepted scientific evidence and theories. That's why it deserves the honorific of "theory".

When Dr Humphreys talked about "evolutionists" working on the problem, he was referring to inflationary theory. He didn't mention it by name because it renders his model unnecessary and he'd rather not publicise it. He said it isn't a working model because he wants you to accept his model without even hearing the alternative, which you did.

He was right in a way because inflationary theory isn't a complete, working model. A complete model would be a Grand Unified Theory or "theory of everything", and science just ain't there yet. We don't expect that from current theories. We just expect them to fit in with the rest of science, or have REALLY good reasons for contradicting it.

What is evolution?

I think we should define some terms before we get into this to deep or we may be talking past each other. I would agree that I "lumped" all scientists whom believe evolution into one group. However I also recognize the teaching of evolution covers many fields of science. And also understand that many believe in different forms of evolution.
Evolution is a slippery word. so lets define what I consider to be the standard understanding of evolution.
I define evolution as
1. a naturalist process by which all of time space and matter came into existence without the intervention of a God (big Bang).
2. that life arose by chance combination of chemicals in a primordial soup several billion years ago (most say about 3 or so billion)
3. that Macro evolution is possible by natural selection and mutations (copying mistakes in the DNA). Bacteria to man evolution.

We are not going to argue over dogs making different looking dogs (sometimes called micro evolution). I would agree that a dog, a coyote, and a wolf probably have a common ancestor. I don't believe a dog and a banana have a common ancestor.

4. That genetic information (the instructions for building life) also arose by chance.
5. That man has come about through the process of Macro evolution and evolved from an "apelike" ancestor.

I would also like to say Dr Humphreys model is not rejected because of a lack of evidence. I haven't found any "real" objections to his work. By real I mean a known contradiction with a law of science. To the best of my knowledge currently People only reject it because the results require a young earth. If one is convinced the earth is old his model can't be true in there mind. Also you would agree there is stigma growing in the science community that “real” scientist believe in a old earth. This also leads people to discredit a creationist work only because he is a creationist. Many “pro-evolution” website I have been too after reading their comments I know they have never even read it work. They just accuse him of not be a real scientist. Science can not progress if we are not objective in our study.
If you know of a specific problem with his model (other then the it all has to be old) I would like to study it.
The problem is if you have your mind made up (not speaking of you directly) that the Universe is billions of years old any thing different from that is rejected. But that is seen in all areas of science, and life through out all history. People use to think the planets and sun went around the earth. And when astronomers begin to question that they were x-communicated. Then when evidence was presented they came up with alternate theory's like the planets travel backwards for a while then go forward again. This happened for a while at least until it was undeniable we go around the sun. The difference here is Historical sciences can never be proven to the point of "laws of science" but we should be able to look at the evidence and pick the Model "creation" or "evolution according to the definition above" that best fits the evidence with the least amount of excepts, and conditions.

Back to the inflation theory. I only said it had problems to be brief, and wasn't aware that Dr R. Humphreys had said anything about the inflation theory.
I don't just copy other people work I believe you should understand things before speak about them... or type them :)
The inflation theory has a few problems right off the top.
1. what is the origin of this type of moment. And what made it stop. It's current predictions don't fit what we observe (this is what I meant by it is being worked on). I am not even implying that they will never have a working idea. but their just seems to be too many assumptions with out any evidence. It is easy to say "well we are here so it must have happened this way" but that is not science that’s just an idea. And that seems to be the concept by which many (not all of course) believe evolution. No one seems to know how it works but they agree it happened. I find that interested. That is really also a form of circular reasoning. "evolution is true because every one else thinks it true". This is what helped change my mind. I only believed it because everyone else believed it, it was what I was taught in HS, and college.

2. The big Band/inflation doesn't explain the rotation of the planets. Not only do they rotate but some (venus and maybe pluto) rotate backwards, Uranus rotates on it's side (90 + degrees upright) Many moons orbit there planet backwards, Saturn and Jupiter have moons going both directions. . . Why is this important? Because of a law of science call the conservation of angular momentum. It says when a spinning object (another good question what made it spin to begin with) brakes apart all the fragments must also spin the same direction to “conserve” momentum. The best answer I can find (if you see something else let me know I will check it out) is that a asteroid hit the planets ( apparently all of them moons too) and caused them to go the other direction.
1. Wow what a impact to change the rotation of a planet.
2. there are no impact craters or other evidence that suggest Venus was hit that hard. Also Venus’s orbit is still very level with the plane of the other planets and sun.

Again it’s just an idea and because someone calls it a theory doesn’t mean it actually qualifies as a theory. By definition a theory must be falsifiable. Evolution is definitely not falsifiable. I don’t think we know enough about “inflation” yet to call it anything but barely a hypothesis. We need evidence that this may have happened or it’s not science. Now of course its ok for someone to “believe” it happened but that’s faith not science. Again I love science and it was the facts that changed me.

So lets keep the playing field level by not making appeals to authority (more scientist believe one way or another) and just consider the facts that fit with the "least" amount of sub theory's and excepts.

1. example being the big bang requires cold dark matter (which we can't see or measure but it must be there because the Big Bang happened) and just see which model works best with what we observe in testable/measureable science.

High points
1. If big bang is true some planets seem to be going the wrong direction.
2. inflation has origin problems, and timing problems. (it expanded quickly then stopped for some unknown reason at just the right time by accident)
3. what is the evidence other then the assumption of the big bang to support inflation?
4. When I refer to evolutionist or evolution I am speaking of the issues pointed out above. And don't mean to imply that all who believe evolution believe all of the above.
Thanks for replying so quickly. . .

Russell Humphreys's flood geology

Now to tackle these flood arguments.

Firstly, on this site I don't "agree to disagree" until a point is moot. For example, I was discussing whether chance can produce information, and eventually a slightly ordered universe. The man who thought not eventually honed his definition of information until it ruled out the kinds of information which are adequate for the development of planets, life, etc. So even if chance can't produce his kind of information, the modern world could come about without it. A god isn't necessary, so I left it at that.

1. Notice that the kinds of animal parts which rot away before sediment can cover the bodies (flesh, organs, brains) don't actually appear in fossils? Bones, shells and other hard bits, on the other hand, can hang around for decades before disintegrating. Put them in the right place and they'll easily last long enough for a slow burial. That's why fossils are skeletal.

2. The undreground chambers would explain the "fountains of the great deep", though it still supposedly rained from nowhere for 40 days as well. Why, in all our mining and deep-core investigations, have we not happened upon evidence of these great reservoirs since? Fault lines are of great interest to those fields of science.

Alternatively, since the Flood was supposed to be an act of God, He could have created all the extra water on the spot and destroyed it when He was done. Whether they involve God or not these explanations aren't evidence for the Flood. They're excuses for a lack of evidence for the Flood.

3. Never mind the mountains, they're the exception. My point was that the rest of the land on Earth had to have been underwater recently. Mountaintops are the only place we might not find evidence of submersion. It should be available in forests, deserts, jungles, tundra, the lot.

4. Same principle. Why only erosion marks here and there? All land should be one big erosion mark. We know water has flowed in many places where it now doesn't (Australia may once have had an inland sea, for example) but water capable of carving the Grand Canyon out of solid rock in less than a year would leave no patch unscarred.

5. The world is flooded if you want to look at it like that, but this Flood was a flood on top of what was already there. If you want to speculate instead that the water just sat there while the land moved up and down, there's a whole other family of geological evidence to look for. Plus, it renders all the "fountains" and rain unnecessary.

6. Dirt and rock do sort into layers. Unless you're certain nobody's got an example of denser material laid down on top of lighter stuff which had already solidified, though, it's a precarious point to make.

7. Just try to imagine a world where this rule held absolutely, and every specimen of a particular extinct species succumbed when the water was at almost exactly the same level. Where no pterodactyl managed to fly to temporary safety when all the other dinosaurs had drowned. Where no Australopithecus managed to grab a fallen tree and float for a week. That's exactly what needs to have happened for like fossils to appear invariably at like depths, as they do. What are the chances that no creature outlasted the rest of its species by six weeks?

The coelacanth need not have gone extinct just because it left the fossil record. Every individual creature has only a tiny chance of becoming a fossil. There are likely many species we will never find as fossils, and therefore never know they existed at all. The coelacanth more likely went extinct or nearly extinct only in shallow waters, where we find most of our fossils, and lived on in the deep ocean.

8. It's a big ocean. It was a gradual progression between marine invertebrates for billions of years before anything even tried to live on land. Who said the time spent on land or with backbones, both arbitrary milestones, had to be comparable to what had come before? Who said evolution had to produce the same extent of obvious changes to shells and skeletons all the way along? If it ain't broke, why fix it?

Which brings us to "living fossils". They are as subject to natural selection as everything else. The difference is that they remain the ones being naturally selected. Sometimes a species, like a coelacanth or a crocodile or a dragonfly, reaches a point where it's so good at surviving and procreating that any further mutations reduce its abilities and are soon bred out. Visible evolution all but stops, but it's a constant battle for the status quo to win out over any new variations. It then takes a drastic change in environment to spur major adaptations.

9. The geologic column exists in its entirety in North Dakota and it's 5000 metres deep, which is just over three miles.

10. Mt St Helens laid down hundreds of layers around Mt St Helens, and the great big exploded mountain in the middle tells us that it's there. For that to have happened worldwide, there'd be evidence of widespread volcanoes just like there'd be ubiquitous evidence for the Flood, but outside of the "Ring of Fire" volcanoes are and always were very rare, at least once the molten Earth had mostly solidified 4 billion years ago.

11. Helium results from decaying uranium in zircons and other rocks, all right, but once that happens it's almost impossible for the helium to get out of the rocks. Dr Humphreys had to use a vacuum chamber. So yes, the helium is there, but in nature it's hardly diffused at all. Here's a full response by someone smarter than me.

There isn't just one method of radiometric dating, there are over a dozen. Any radioactive isotope will do. The most commonly used are uranium-lead, radiocarbon and potassium-argon. Some are indeed unreliable in some situations, so they're no longer used in those situations. To date an object accurately, several of the methods are used to establish a consensus and weed out any strange results.

Importantly, when radiometric dating gets it wrong the margin of error might be 90% (that's me being VERY pessimistic) but when the result is 65 million years, the youngest the object might actually be is 6.5 million years. No method of radiometric dating has the margin of error of 99.99% required for any dinosaur fossil to possibly be 6500 years old.

I appreciate that presenting me with this list of young-earth arguments may have been your way of obtaining the standard responses to each. If however you actually seek to convince me of something, may I recommend that you research your own arguments for a minute first to make sure there isn't already an answer floating about. I pulled most of the above from Google and Wikipedia alone, and so can you.

This talk by Humphreys or his representative, and whatever print material you've brought home from it, is intended to persuade you on the spot, before you think to question it. It succeeded. Now it's time to view what you were given in the full light of supporting and contradictory science, evidence and lack thereof. Don't just go by my answers, see what you can find yourself. Read both full sides of the argument and make a decision. Then come back here and tell us what you've chosen and why.

Have fun.

Order screwed up.

The order in which we're responding is separating questions from their answers. This is a response to the post which starts: "I think we should define some terms before we get into this to deep or we may be talking past each other."

I suspected you encompass too much in your definition of evolution, and I was right: like Kent Hovind, you take it to mean any natural process which makes a god unnecessary. To address your points directly:

1. Evolution has nothing to do with the origin of the universe. Its domain starts once self-replicating organisms exist. But okay, we can argue separately about the Big Bang and the age of the universe.

2. The origin of life is abiogenesis, in which some natural selection may have been involved but which isn't evolution as such. But okay, we can argue about the origin of life.

3. Biology largely dropped the terms "microevolution" and "macroevolution" a century ago. They're the same thing over different time scales. Microevolution repeated ten thousand times over is macroevolution. But okay, we can argue about speciation and human evolution.

4 is strictly correct though it is worded to make it sound hard. 5 is fine.

The constant speed of light in a vacuum is more fundamental than any human-made law of science, Jeremy. It's the basis of most of Einstein's work (it's the c in E = mc^2). It's one of those fundamental constants which people who use the fine-tuning argument are always saying God set to a specific value. Humphreys' model, I imagine, is rejected by scientists not because the results require a young earth, but because they require the speed of light to change. Therefore the amount of energy in a given mass changes, and most of established physics goes out the window. There is no evidence anywhere of the speed of light changing in a vacuum (it does slow down in water or glass) unless you first assume a young earth. This, I am sure you do not doubt, is the first thing Dr Humphreys did.

To apply this to a later point of yours, a variable speed of light is a greater stretch to make a model work than planets going backwards ever was.

Much of his claimed evidence, like the sodium in the sea for example, is not evidence for his cosmological model at all but evidence for a young earth. If he advocates his model so that people will accept a young earth, why is a young earth the main premise of it? That, Jeremy, is circular reasoning.

You're using a skewed version of Occam's Razor when presenting the choice between creation and a specific type of evolution. If you want the smallest number of exceptions and conditions then it's creation with no contest, because a creator is a single condition and a single exception. The issue is that a creator is a universal condition with no precedent or known qualities (or even ontology - we wouldn't know what it is) and it is an exception to every single natural law (given that it could break them all).

Moving on to your problems with inflationary theory, which are mostly problems with cosmology in general.

1. Inflationary theory makes no assumption more extravagant than a variable speed of light. Sorry to harp on about that, but it's true. Besides the basic assumption of the Big Bang, it assumes a single, temporary outward force, a force with an existing name and a source, and after that lets nature take its course. Never mind the argument from majority, which we agree is a fallacy. (If you're in America, it's possible that creationists are in the majority around you anyway.) It gained acceptance in the first place because it explains a mysterious phenomenon without resorting to the invention of any new force or substance, and because it explains other unexplained phenomena which weren't even part of the reason it was formulated.

2. The rotation of the planets has little to do with the Big Bang and much to do with gravity. While the best existing explanation for Uranus being sideways is a large impact (perhaps a moon falling out of orbit), the reverse-orbiting moons were more likely rogue moons. They may have escaped from other planets, previously orbited the hypothetical former planet which is now the asteroid belt or come in from outside and been captured by the pull of Jupiter and Saturn. It seems more likely when you consider that those two are the biggest planets.

Venus is a puzzle, but the amount of heat beneath its surface currently has two contrary hypotheses surrounding it: that it escapes continually and invisibly, or it periodically has a huge upheaval where the whole landscape is changed. Any sign of impact before one of these upheavals would be erased. Not a certain explanation, but one alternative.

Evolution is falsifiable. Ever heard of irreducible complexity? If an example were ever found, if something were unable to be simplified in any way such that its precursors were useful, it could not have evolved. It's just that all claimed examples so far have turned out to be reducible. Besides, weren't some of your 11 pro-Flood arguments (e.g. the coelacanth) attempts to prove exceptions to evolutionary theory? If it's not falsifiable, why bother?

You know, I did make a point of saying the fact that many scientists disagree with Humphreys doesn't mean he's wrong. I said that their actual arguments against him (start with Wikipedia) are available and worth considering. I linked to a very detailed response to the helium diffusion argument; did you have a look?

Finally, Jeremy, which is more likely: cold dark matter or a god?

Big Bang and angular M. issue.

Wow where to begin. First I would like to give a few complements. I am excited to have a stable intelligent discussion about these issues. And I think your questions have been reasonable and fair questions to ask if the creation model be true we should understand most if not all of your questions. I have discussed this with “atheist” (I use that word carefully), before and most often they don’t have answers but refuse to consider the alternative. It usually turns into “you are just a dump creationist” but no real understanding of what has been proven and what we ultimately believe because we just want to believe that. You have yet to call me a name (other then Jeremy) this has been surprisingly different and I thank you for that.

Now a few general comments. As to my “conversion” to young earth beliefs I have been studying this subject for about a year now. I was not an “overnight” convert. AT FIRST I THOUGHT IT WAS CRAZY. But I love science and if I was wrong I wanted to know. So I begin to look up some of the things mentioned and bought some books. I have given probably 15 or so presentations on the subject since then at churches, high schools, and library’s etc (when you learn you have been lied to you want to tell people). I don’t claim to be an expert but I am well studied on the subject, and have a full library of creation and evolution books (I mean written by evolutionist, and creationist). Also very aware of what your responses might be to my objects (as I have heard many of them in my Q and A sessions and read them in anti-creation books. (For example asteroid impact to change the rotation of a planet, and captured moons to explain the angular Mom. Problem). I didn’t include them in my first response for 2 reasons.
1. I didn’t want to put words in your mouth if you had better answers then what I have heard before. 2. To reduce the length of my responses as I know they are long. I mentioned before anyone can say “it must have happened that way because the big bang is true” but that is not evidence. These arguments don’t hold up under more objects (which I will give in a minute). So maybe after my rebuttal here I will encourage you to do more research. But I feel I am currently ready to answer any objection to the creation model in all the fields of science it covers.

You make a good point about Occam’s razor but that is not what I am suggesting. I certainly agree that science it a study of the natural world and we should use natural phenomena to explain what we see. I am not suggesting that God just made now accept it with out evidence. I believe it can be demonstrated with the laws of science that there ust be a God who created the universe with it laws in place to control it. The study of Origins is very different from the study of a plant. We can use chemistry and physics to explain how a plant works, but that does NOT explain where the plant came from? These are extremely Different questions! If I build a robot, the laws of math, electricity, and physics could explain how it walks and works, but again don’t explain it’s origin. In this case me being the origin. You mention Dr Hovind. I only want to briefly say overall I think he has been great at getting the word out and helping people ask the right questions. However I was always concerned that he was a little too zealous. He has put up some strong debates despite that fact that people don’t like him. Remember many don’t like creationist at all and to have a radically one is worst! I would not call myself an admirer, or following in his footsteps. I do believe to many people blindly accept evolution without at least checking to see if what is claimed is true. But MOST IMPORTANTLY being able to separate the fact’s from the interpretation. I.E. One fact being there are dead animals laid down by water all over the earth (The only way to get sedimentary rock). We see the same bones but one says big flood made fossils, the other they just happened to die under the right conditions and maybe get buried later by local flood, or mud flow. (we will get to this later I promise)

Also I think we have put too many topics on the table for anyone reading to follow so I will narrow it down (for now) to stars, planets, and the big bang, and age of the solar system. However I am excited about the flood geology and have answers for your questions regarding the flood. (which again are very good questions) later I will give examples of large scale erosion, explain the G. Canyon etc when we get back to that.

Cold dark matter or God.

As I said we ultimately have to believe (by faith without evidence) in God, or something else… Cold dark matter for example. It is assumed to be there. Sure it helps fix a issue in the model but that is an issue of faith. I think some people forget (not necessarily you) that we are looking at the same evidence. The same planets, rocks, fossils, canyons etc and we must start with a bias (I.E. There is a God who created, there isn’t) we then look at the evidence and come to conclusions that agree with our preconceived idea. I.E no God means it happened by chance, Creator God means it has purpose.

One more thing. My goal is really not to “convince” you. No amount of evidence can change a fixed heart (if yours is such the case). My goal was only to share with you the creation model help you and others understand with it actually teaches and show it fits the facts we observe today. But at the end of the day we believe what we want to believe.

Now lets get to the Big Bang.
The angular Momentum issue is exactly a Big Bang problem Here why.
1. According to the text book (I have about 6 or 7 middle school to college level) The big bang started as a swirling(spinning) cloud of gas and dust, it expanded and then gravity begin to “collect” the dust into (leaving out stuff on purpose) planets stars, etc.
Problems.
1. Saying an asteroid hit it is a miracle. An object from space big enough to change the rotation of a planet is major enough. But to say the conditions on the planet make it difficult or impossible to show that crater is not evidence but explaining the lack of evidence. That’s faith. Also I mentioned that the planet should show some kind of change in orbit (having a more elliptical orbit) if it was hit hard enough to not only slow down its spin to a stop but spin it the other direction. Venus has one of the most level (and round) orbits in our solar system.
2. Uranus is way to large to just believe it was hit with such a massive astreiod that it tipped over! WOW what great faith. The only proof of such an idea is that if it were not true it would disprove The Big Bang. You can’t break the conservation law. Uranus Earth and Venus have the most circular obits on the solar system. This is a solid argument.

3. The problem is bigger because there are galaxies that spin backwards. No amount of asteroids will spin the whole galaxy backwards. CNN ran a article last year (I use a copy of it in my presentations) that says in the head lines “Goofy galaxy spins backwards leaving astronomers scratching there heads!” If you look online you probably could find it. And there is more then one “spinning” the wrong way.

4. Quick note… Moons also have very circular obits which should not be the case if they were indeed captured.

5. To capture these large bodies (moons) requires great precision. Most would come in too close and break apart or crash into the planet. Also the gravity of the planet would accelerate it back out into space faster then it came in. The same method we use to get things out into the deep parts of space now.

Other problems with Big Bang. (There are about 10 I can think of on the top of my head if you are interested in going though all of them but I am picking the ones I believe are easier for you to validate what I claim)

1. You can’t get even one star to form. Or a planet. And there are over 100 billions galaxies each with over 100 billion stars.
Yes gravity attracts the particles together but Gas pressure pushes them apart. Do the math and the gas pressure is 60 times greater then the gravity. If any evolutionary website claims they know how stars form. I am sorry to tell you it’s not true. The top guys in this field all admit they don’t know how even one star forms.
The best example I have seen is one guy suggested that if 20 stars exploded near each other they would create enough force to over come gas pressure. I could only laugh because even if that happened you have to lose 20 to get 1. That is the opposite of what you want to get billions, and billions of stars. I also (just incase you mention it) read one say they see a star forming now but all they have is glowing gases, and you get exactly the same thing from a super nova. You can’t demonstrate that it is a star forming. We know a super nova creates glowing gases, we don’t know how a star forms. So they are imposing the idea on the data instead of letting the data speak. If you say it happens to slow to observe well again that is a faith based statement. If you can’t observe or test it that’s not science.
I am really trying to keep my answers short. I will cut it off with this last point.
It has been demonstrated that the speed of light can be changed and even stopped. All you had to do is search for slowing the speed of light, and you will find many scientists have been able to change the speed of light in various ways. You and I both agree that Einstein was smart and thought light was constant but this idea seems to be changing as we find out more information. Also the inflation theory requires an expansion faster then the speed of light wouldn’t that require a faster speed of light? To be completely honest I am not sure about that (requiring a faster light speed for inflation) I will check into that. And to clarify something you said Dr Humphreys suggested a change in the “speed of TIME”. HE believed Einstein’s theory and used it for his model. Light is a constant in his theory! You should check that out you might be surprised. Other creationist suggested a change in “speed of Light”. I did concede that they may both be wrong and it happened another way we don’t understand yet.
So lets start there…
I would like your permission to copy in it’s entirety (later after it is more complete) our exchange on my website if that is okay with you.
Thanks again for being rational and addressing the science questions with me instead of just calling names.

Angular M.

One last thing. The sun has 99 percent of the mass but only 2% of the angular momentum. This is directly opposite of what the big bang would predict. The greater mass should have the greatest momentum. The Sun spinnings very slow but the planets go extremely fast (66000 mph for earth). That doesn't work for the Big Bang.

Hi Jeremy. Yeah, it's tough

Hi Jeremy. Yeah, it's tough to get a decent conversation out of the other side too. I think many of them honestly think our only response will be to get thoroughly stumped and hurl insults. I must admit this is partly why I'm so polite.

Thanks for giving some background on yourself. The initial arguments looked rehearsed enough that I figured they were straight from Dr Humphreys' books or representatives. Now I realise that you are acting as his representative.

I take it you already believed in God before you became a young-earth creationist. You're very pessimistic about convincing anyone who's biased against belief. By your analysis, the only people who might become young-earth creationists are old-earth creationists (of various religions) and possibly agnostics. So why present your arguments here? Why not go about making believers of atheists from some other angle first, and then convince them of a young earth? I think you're more hopeful of hitting the tough targets than you let on.

I appreciate you wanting to shorten posts and improve focus, but you can do better than, "I have answers but I won't write them for now." Give us the names and links of actual books and articles to read, especially since you say the books ultimately convinced you.

Turns out the "cold dark matter or God" question is moot, because they found the stuff earlier this year. There's a great big stripe of it in front of a colourful galaxy, and filaments of it running through many others. There might still be a god, but there sure is dark matter.

My replies about the solar system do not say, "It must have happened that way because the Big Bang is true." Your arguments are aiming for, "It could not have happened that way, therefore the Big Bang is false." My replies are along the lines of, "If the Big Bang is true then it could have happened like this, so it's not as impossible or improbable as you make out."

All of your and Humphreys' arguments have a similar thrust. A thing or phenomenon or state of affairs, despite existing, is impossible to achieve by natural means or in an old universe. Therefore it was influenced or done outright in a short time by a supernatural being such as God. The general form is that of an argument from ignorance. This isn't an insult, I mean it in the classical sense: because a viable alternative is not known, there isn't one. It's a fallacy. You can certainly argue probabilities, but in no case do you actually know that there is no possible way for these things to happen naturally, or over billions of years, unless you're omniscient yourself. Even if a way is never found, there might still be one. You cannot prove beyond reasonable doubt that a God or a young earth is necessary with this kind of argument, ever.

To specifics.

1. You know better than I do what a miracle is. An asteroid is not one. It happens all the time. Remember the Schumacher comet that broke up and hit Jupiter? There's no evidence of that now, because Jupiter has no solid surface. A slightly different trajectory, and it could have made it to the inner planets instead.

You said yourself that Venus has a unique orbit, and you say its orbit must have changed; put the two together. It may well have started more elliptical like the others, but been bashed inward at the major axis of its path (or outward at the minor axis, or even both).

Yes, the Venus upheaval process is a possible explanation of the lack of evidence, just like your idea of where the Flood waters went, but this is in response to an argument that the asteroid strike is impossible. I'm not trying to prove the event (I don't even know if it's what happened), merely show that it can't be ruled out. There will be other possibilities neither of us has thought of as well, so ruling it out doesn't leave you with only your hypothesis either. It's not faith if you can't choose, and we really can't.

By comparison, I don't think the Flood is impossible. I just think it's improbable, and any of the supposed effects of the Flood on the modern world have a plethora of possible explanations and are not good evidence for this particular one. You're trying to rule out ALL other explanations.

2. It's not faith if you don't know what you believe. I said a collision was the best explanation, and I may be wrong, but it's not the only one. You're creating a false dilemma. Again it may have been captured from outside, its circular orbit may be due to the collision rather than despite it, or other objects passing through may have pulled it any which way. There are almost unlimited options, not two. None of them is terribly likely by itself, but the sheer number of possibilities supplies a larger cumulative probability that it has a natural explanation.

3. I'm starting to realise that you think the angular momentum comes directly from the Big Bang. While the universe as a whole may well be spinning, nothing prevents individual pieces of it from spinning the other way within the larger rotation. Angular momentum for a solar system or galaxy is created by local gravity; two lumps of matter are pulled together and miss, and which way they turn back towards each other depends on whether it was a left-to-left pass or right-to-right. If the larger rotation creates a bias, that may be why we only see one "goofy" galaxy.

...and, come to think of it, one "goofy" planet. Perhaps one little part of the inner cloud swirled together the wrong way and formed Venus' core? Or two lumps passed just above and below one another and made Uranus' core? Angular momentum is conserved, but it doesn't have to be homogenous. See a problem with this hypothesis? Sound more likely than asteroids?

4. Moons have round orbits, but moons also have very close orbits. If they were also elliptical the way some of the planets' orbits are, they might be ripped apart by gravitational forces when they got too close. Over billions of years this may already have happened to some of them. In fact, that's what we think the rings of Saturn (among others) are, so there's circumstantial evidence that any moons with sufficiently eccentric orbits have already been culled.

5. How many moons might have already crashed into Jupiter? How many might have swung around a planet once and been flung off into space? The moons we see have good clean orbits because if it was otherwise, they wouldn't still be there. Nobody said the solar system gets it right every time.

On to the more general issues.

1. Name one such top astrophysicist if you're going to make a generalisation like that. Back yourself up, Jeremy!

As matter accumulates around the centre, inward and outward pressure increases, and so therefore does temperature. This can go on indefinitely until you run out of matter or the core temperature reaches the point where fusion reactions occur in the compressed hydrogen. Bang, fuse, sizzle, shine. What is it that stops the temperature from rising if the matter keeps coming, and what would you expect such a clump of matter to do instead?

2. After a bit of research I'll agree with you that the speed of light has been slowed by scientists by various means, but I already knew that. They put stuff in its way. It was exotic stuff, but you can do the same to a lesser extent with glass. The speed of light in a vacuum is still constant. Besides, doesn't Dr Humphreys' model require light to have travelled faster than the constant relative to us, not slower? Any examples of that happening?

As for changes in the speed of time, relativity does allow for that, but for 6000 years to pass for us while billions of years go by elsewhere requires us to be travelling at well over 99% of the speed of light. Since only the edges of the universe can be expanding at the speed of light, we would be catching up with nearer matter in the direction of our movement and there would be a visible blueshift instead of the omnipresent redshift.

3. You're not taking the Sun's enormous magnetic field into account when you point out the odd distribution of angular momentum. It's been braking itself since the beginning by dragging on all the charged particles it emits. It would have had the most angular momentum to start with, but not after five billion years.

You can reproduce this discussion when it's done if you like. Just tell me what your site actually is, give me an address so I can see it and include a link back to here.

flood and general comments

Interestingly enough I think we are beginning to get somewhere. I hope I didn’t give the impression I think all nonbelievers are rude. I have had old earth creationist be rude. I had one say “if it wasn’t for you Young earther’s we could convince all that believe in the big bang of God.” (he likes to argue from the first cause perspective you know like who started it all to begin with). I think that’s ok but what kind of God are you left with? One how doesn’t seem to care that much about his creation to start it and then just leave it. That doesn’t seem to be what the bible is saying. Ok a few more comments on what we have so far then on to the flood. And I will give you some of the references you asked for names quotes, websites etc at the end of this. If I have time I will post some pictures on my website for you to view which will go along with my flood arguments.
General points.
1. why am I here doing this? I didn’t mean to sound pessimistic, I am extremely optimistic. I see after reading it again why you get that impression. I don’t plan to make a lot of references to the bible accept where needed But I need to make a few here. In 1 Tim chp. 3 it says “be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason for the hope that is in you” I actually found your website looking for questions people had about the flood. and as I read the conversation I thought most of the questions came from not really knowing what creationist teach about the flood. Then at the end I think it was you who says “maybe a creationist should respond” or something like that. Sounded like a request I could fill so I chimed in not really knowing what to expect. If you would even post my comments at all I didn’t know. The bible also say that “some will believe, some will say I will hear you again on this matter, and some will walk away.” I don’t know enough about you to decide which you would be (this is what I meant by “if yours is such the case”. I have seen people do all of the above. Some ask more questions and become interested (many have called or come back later changed) and some never accept God or the gospel. Very few accept it right away and I expect that (being I was an example of that not accepting right way). I even told my wife how much I have enjoyed our “debate” and hoped you or someone who happens to read it (like me) would someday change their mind.
This is so important I will say it again. I think the real issue at hand is naturalism vs. God. The Big Bang starts with the assumption that “nature is all there is or ever was”. You and I both agree (I think) that this is a philosophical (religious) statement. We both know you can never PROVE there is no God (you would have to be God to prove he doesn’t exist). And if that is the case (there is no God) the job is to explain what we see based on nature alone. Examples you gave were “given enough time the right asteroid could possibly come ago and create such an orientation”. I wouldn’t argue much with that accept only to say many ideas are “possible” in 20 billion years. Also I didn’t say Venus’s orbit has changed or was unusual. I was saying it has the Most circular (stable/flat/ undisturbed) orbit. Only Earth has a more circular orbit. This is what I mean by no evidence of collision. You can’t see evidence of that in it’s orbit or on the surface. It should be off or disturbed or something. Same with Uranus. Now to the idea of it starting with an unlevel orbit there’s no way to check that however I agree contingent upon all of the above it is another possibility.
2. I would have to disagree with you on the particles being able to start out spinning the wrong way, and I will just leave it at that.
3. It would seem in a way that Time, and matter is the God of evolution. Also Believe in Creation is philosophical/ religious. We start with the assumption that the bible is the written word of God and thus must be true. I know that, this is why I am pointing it out. And we look at stars billions of light years away and explain what we see based on that?” They are both deeply religious.

4. Every scientist can agree on empirical science. But we also all have a bias (our starting belief of God or No God) and study the past (sometimes called historical science) coming to conclusions based on what we already believe.

5. If you start with assumption “A” you will always come to conclusions that agree with “A”
6. Is it possible that it all occurred naturally in a way we don’t yet understand? Absolutely YES it is possible.
7. Is it possible that God created everything in 6 days about 6000 years ago YES it is possible.
8. Is it possible that God created everything 5 minutes ago complete with memory YES! We must have something to compare all thoughts too and decide if they are true. We ultimately start with a bias and decide what we want to believe. And/ or which model seems most reasonable to us.
9. My goal (still) is to show people that the creation model is reasonable. I believe what really bothers people is the implications of one or the other. If there is a God then there is sin, heaven, hell etc. No God = no sin, no hell etc.
One quick example of why I believe in Creation.
We can predict the sunrise for the next 200 years down to the very second. This level of order and complexity seems unreasonable to have happened by chance. But we can always come up with ideas about how it could have happened by chance. This is what I mean also by evolution (ultimately naturalism) is not falsifiable. You mentioned irreducible complexity as an example. I agree to an extent with you. And I believe it creates problems for evolution but one could always think of a hypothetical scenario where such a creature or whatever could be reduced. A better way would be for evolutionist to demonstrate that early precursor in nature or the fossil record. I was reading online some one bashing Michael Behe’s book (which I have but have not finished it) Darwin’s black box. And they spent page after page explaining how a mouse trap could be made with two parts instead of five. My first thought was he missed the whole point. One cell is millions of times more complex then a mouse trap. That was just an example of the concept. Again we can come up with hypothetical examples of how a cell might be reduced but to the best of my knowledge there are no examples of this to observe or demonstrate evolution. We just say “because it might be possible” evolution is still okay. This I believe makes it unfalsifiable.
10. I think it is funny that you call me a representative of Humphreys. There are (according to ICR.org website) appox. 10,000 Young earth creation scientists in the U.S. alone. So It might be better to say we represent the bibles interpretation of creation, however either way I take your statement as a compliment. Humphreys is much smarter then me. I don’t qualify to represent his ability to debate for creation.
11. I will research the finding of cold dark matter. Innumerable claims have been made in the name of science then when you check what they “actually” found it is not nearly as impressive as claimed. I am not saying you are wrong just that I want to confirm it. Also I would like a source for that information. We can come back to it later.

So a few reference for the Star formation and angular momentum problem then we are on to the flood.

1. There is a video you can download or watch online from the North western creation network called Our_solar_system. It is an outstanding presentation if you like astronomy as I do. Even if you don’t agree with his conclusions you would like the video and awesome pictures of the planets and moons. Also you can download the power point and check the references (of which some I have checked myself).

Some astronomers (all big bang believers) who speak frankly about the star problem.

2. Martin Harwitt “The universe we see when we look out to its furthest horizons contains a hundred billion galaxies. Each of these galaxies contains another hundred billion stars. That’s 10 to the 22 power stars all told. The silent embarrassment of modern astrophysics is that we do not know how even a single one of these stars managed to form.”
Book Reviews, Science, Vol. 231, pp. 1201-1202

3.C.J Lada and F.H shu “Most disturbing, however, is the fact that despite numerous efforts, we have yet to directly observe the process of stellar formation. We have not yet been able to unambiguously detect the collapse of a molecular cloud core or the infall of circumstellar material onto an embryonic star. Until such an observation is made, it would probably be prudent to regard our current hypotheses and theoretical scenarios with some degree of suspicion.”
“Star Formation: From OB Associations to Protostars,” IAU Symposium 115, pg. 1

MY FAVORITE For “New Scientist”
Abraham Loeb, Harvard Center for Astrophysics, "The truth is that we don't understand star formation at a fundamental level." New Scientist, V.157, 2/7/1998, p.30

When you are talking to a high school earth science class you can say what ever you want and no one will question you. . . but when you are the head of the astrophysics department at Harvard you have to tell the truth “we don’t know how it happens”

As one creationist put it “If you release Gas from an aerosol can it expanses out and will never condense back on itself. Why would one expect it to be different in outer space?
Heat builds up and Gas pressure increases because of the heat. Again pushing out and no Star of any kind.
We see the blow up all the time, we don’t see them forming. Which we should at the rate required to get this many stars you need a little over 6,000 stars per minute in 20 billion years. We just don’t see that.

Finally to the flood.

You brought up a lot of issues with the geology of the flood so I want to as briefly as I can describe what we believe the Preflood world was like, next what happened during the flood. Some of your questions came from simply not knowing what we think happened. After that you can argue your points more affectively I think when we are on the same page.

By the way I am really enjoying this! This is very engaging and it is my favorite subject to talk about. I wear my clients out talking about creation.

As stated above ultimately both models start with some assumptions.

Here we go…

Before the flood conditions on the earth were different. There was one continent that was about 70 to 80% of the earths surface. (just 20% water with relatively low mountains compared to today).
Every thing from plants, to people was created perfect without defect. This means they should have had perfect health, better developed bodies etc. Animals were also created perfect and fully formed. So when looking into the fossil record we would expect to see things that exhibit that. Here are a few examples of what we find. Extremely large animals of all types from giant frogs to two ton ducks. Not just dinosaurs. and Super sized bugs. . . All the Bugs. Cockroaches 1.5 ft long, locust 2 feet long, a donkey 9 ft tall at the shoulders, A normal human thigh was found in Texas 47 inches long. They estimated he was about 16 ft tall. A child 9 year old was found that was 5’6” (the article said they could tell by the teeth). 5’6” is a giant for a 9 year old. However you won’t see his picture in the text book because according to the standard model we started out small and are getting bigger.

Neanderthal man had a larger brain and a massively muscular body. The reconstruction printed in Discover magazine reminded me of a WWF wrestler. He would look a little strange but no one would pay him much attention on the street. As long as evolution is taught there will always we a hand full of latest claims but no “ancestors” presents so far have been water tight. They have falling into three boxes. Apes, fakes, and people. But really no fossil could prove evolution because you could never prove that bone was the ancestor of people living today. You can only know it was a creature that died. But that is a side subject we can get to later.

If the creation model is true we should see only a natural sustaining or decrease of order, health, number of creatures etc. And indeed we are getting sicker we have more diseases then ever in history. (I don’t remember the rate I will check it if you want to know). Mutations (copying mistakes in the DNA) increase by 100 mutations every generation. These along is good evidence humans haven’t been around very long or we would have long since been non functional. You can only have so many “errors” before you don’t work at all.
Creation would predict that things would started perfect and would be “running down” in agreement with the 2nd law of thermodynamics. And indeed every thing is running down, impling it must have been “up” to run down. Examples stars burning out, comets are burning up, usable energy is running down, animal extinction (over 1200 animals on the endangered list), mutations in DNA increasing, Things are getting worst from a state of “best”. And that seems to be what we observe. The 2nd law says that disorder will increase. (closed system or open doesn’t matter) the 2nd law works just fine in a open system. This is were we test the law (in a open system) so we know that is the case. Even when something is not used it wears out. You can buy a new car and park it the first day in the yard. The next year you have a useless car with all kinds of problems.

This initially perfect world was destroyed with a catastrophic flood where in the subterranean water burst through the crust of the earth at the seams. I found an article about drillers in Japan hit a under water chamber under extreme pressure. They reported that there may still be more water under ground then there is on top today. This water, under extreme pressure, shot up into the atmosphere and fell down until the pressure reduced but the water continued to come up. The rapidly eroding walls of rock and dirt where the water was coming out would start massive underwater mud slides (also called turbidity currents) burying deep ocean life quickly. We find many fish articulated as though they were buried extremely fast. I.E. fossils of a fish eating another fish, a fish giving birth etc. 95% of the fossil record is marine invertebrates (like jelly fish no backbone). Of the remaining 5%, 4.5% are plants. Vertebrates only make up 1/10th of 1% of the entire fossil record. The rest consist of various fish with a backbone. When you look at pictures in text books they depict mostly vertebrates which would not be an accurate depiction of what we find. You would expect to find mostly fish and clams in a marine catastrophe. And you would expect to find things buried in a way to indicate it was sudden. There would have been many if not all of the volcanoes on the earth going off and throwing out steam, and lava also. This had many other effects that we can talk about later if it comes up. There are thousands of volcanoes on the bottom of the ocean today. The water came up over the course of about 150 days where the water level came up and killed more and more land animals. There would have been massive water currents creating whirlpools. Dead animals would float along and get sucked into a whirl pool burying the animals in one spot. This is what we call fossil graveyards like at Dinosaurs national monument. Lots of bones tangled and buried together. Many still articulated (meaning the didn’t lay there very long before covered in sediment. Doesn’t really make since in a slow gradual bury scenario. Some animals have been preserved with the skin organs and all. Like the Hadrosaur found by Tyler Lyson in North Dakota. Again testimony to a rapid burial. Those better able to avoid the water lived the longest and went to ever higher ground and were basically buried on top. However I believe that some would be unable to avoid the water all over earth since the moon still creates the tides. Basically like a tsunami every 6 hours. I believe there should be some examples of fossils “Out of place” and indeed there are many examples of that. However the more disturbing ones (man in the same layer as a dinosaur) would have to be explained another way by evolutionary geologist I.E. someone buried it there etc. Examples of living fossils would falsify the idea that an animal went extinct based on there presents in the fossil record. So that even Dinosaurs may not be extinct for they are ONLY considered extinct for the exact same reason the living fossils were considered extinct. Based on that there is no reason to think any of these animals lived at different times. The Cambrian explosion demonstrates and extremely wide array of different body types which based on evolution would have to had to evolve in a geologic blink of an eye as SJ Gould put it.

As the sides of the walls erode way the basalt rock underneath would spring up pushing the above rock away sliding on top of the lubricating water still beneath it at. This sliding mass of land would crash into other land masses buckling the land pushing up mountains pushing down valleys and the water would rush off the land into the low places leaving massive erosion surfaces on all the continents. And significantly more water on the surface of the earth then before. (Pictures will be posted on my website later). This explains why the mountain ranges generally follow the coast line of the continents. Also this explains large erosionally remnants like Devils Tower very soft both sides agree their has been erosion all around it but why is such a thin tall tower standing baring eroding while everything around it is washing away for millions of years? Same in Monument Valley. Again soft rock standing while every thing around it erodes. We would expect that with a large flood recently but not just standing for millions of years. Creationist believe this is an area where sheet erosion rapidly washed away the rock the current was slower in this area as the water washed around it. Evidence of extremely large scare rapid erosion.

We find fossilized clams on the top of every mountain range in the world. Mt Everest the tallest mountain in the world has layers of sedimentary rock on the top and massive 2 ton fossilized clams. Another example of bigger in the past not smaller. The continental shelf is excellent evidence for large sheet erosion. Doesn’t make much since if you think about normal erosion over millions of years. It should be a gentle slope, not a sharp drop.

Many cities have been found underwater where it appears that people lived and built houses etc before there was water there. But then those places got covered (I believe around the end of the flood. As far as I know creationist and evolutionist agree the water level use to be lower, and there use to be one large continent that broke up, that the mountains arose relatively recently (last few million years according to the “GC” time scale) and that the individual layers formed quickly. The main differences again are the mechanism time + nature or One major catastrophe. And the time frames. huge gaps in between the layers where millions of years of erosion too place, or rapid deposit of layers.
Some evidence for rapid layers would be ripple marks (like what you see at the beach with each wave) in what was soft mud. But the ripple marks only last until the next few waves wash them away. Yet they get preserved. We believe because the next layer quickly covered the first and preserved them like a fossil.

There was water trapped on the land (lakes, and ponds) after the water rain off the continents. One of which was a huge post flood lake covering several states. Above where the grand canyon is. This lake begin to flow over a low spot and once you have a incise cut open all the water rushes through it cutting out the canyon rapidly. (Estimates range from 1 to 3 or so weeks.) The canyon below the Mt Saint Helens mud flow is identical to the Grand Canyon. It is even called the “Mini Grand Canyon”. The mud flow from Mt Saint Helens was, I believe, about a year after the eruption which is also what we predict about the flood. The Grand Canyon was craved at the very end or shortly after the flood. All the rivers have “under fit” deltas. In other waters there must have been a time when considerably more water was flowing through them.
This is getting long I will cut it off and let you respond.

This is a good place to start the flood discussion though. I got a chance today to look at the link you added above. It’s a long article so give me a little time to read it all/check the statements and we will discuss the dating method later. Please also take the time to watch that video and give your thoughts. Just reading the first two paragraphs the article writer seems a little hostile towards Dr Humphreys. There was a whole team working on this project called The RATE GROUP not just him. Again without having read all his objects yet I know the Rate group used several independent labs to get there measured rates (they didn’t measure the rate themselves, they simply sent the rocks to independent labs and had them measure the diffusion rates for the RATE group. (certainly not a creation lab their isn’t one as far as I know). This was on purpose so they would not be accused of fudging the numbers. They only took the numbers given to them by the lab and give their conclusions of the results. He seems to be says the test was bias or done under the wrong conditions. . . I will check on that.
I hope this better explains what we think happened. Now lets ask questions and give any objections you have.

please ignore the typ-o's I was rushing a little.

I didn't notice you also

I didn't notice you also asked about books and other references for flood. Here is a article Answers a creation Science journal. And the video above doesn't seem to have the link so here it is.
Answers Journal
http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v3/n3/transcontinental-rock-layers
Our solar System Video
http://nwcreation.net/videos/our_solar_system.html
books
The young Earth by Henry Morris

The case for the creator By Lee Strobel I was interested in him because he use to be an athiest. And he talks about what changed his mind through his research.

The case for Christ Also Lee Strobel

The Question of origins By Shelby Macfarlene. a Text book that deals fairly I think with both sides.

Icons of evolution by Jonathan Wells dealing with problems in the text books.

And Darwins black Box by Michael Behe. (intelligent design book)

The Answers Book by Ken Ham. this is a much more "bible based" version of the others. More scriptures etc but presented very plainly and clearly.

I also plan to get the RATE book. by ICR get more on the rate project.

Their are alot on my shelf but these pretty much cover what the others have to say.

Thanks Jeremy.

Thanks for all this Jeremy. I'll reply properly when I have the time; you must admit there's a lot here.

creation model

I understand completely. I am still reading the Helium diffusion paper. Though I can't challenge data I don't understand. And some of it I admit is over my head. However I am interested in the truth. It's the only way to learn anything. I at least know why Dr Henke is mad with Humphreys. They have been going back and forth. Dr Henke give a lengthy response to the rate groups results and Dr Humphreys replied. This last one is Dr Henke's response to Humphreys.

Dr Humphreys called it "mud slinging without evidence" among other things.

It's a challenge to read two PH.D's argument over Helium diffusion rates in zircon crystals. If you are interested Dr Humphreys paper in PDF is here.
http://www.icr.org/pdf/rate/humphreys_to_hanke.pdf

And on

Hi Jeremy. Thanks for waiting (I lost a nearly-complete response by accident and was frustrated for a while), and thanks for all the references. The general ones will provide a great deal of background to people reading this later. The astrophysics links in particular I'll be going through in full when I can. That's an area of special interest for me.

I have a much better understanding of what you're doing here. Like us, you're answering questions. I can't find where I asked for a creationist's take, but if I didn't I should have at some point.

I'm not saying you're endorsed by Humphreys, but taking his exact position, basing your arguments on his work and especially making speeches to advocate his model and his cause is pretty darn representative. In the same way, I'm a representative of Dawkins (I don't currently do speeches, but I would if asked).

The issue is not as narrow as "naturalism vs God". It's a huge leap to throw in with the God of Abraham as soon as you believe naturalism is false. God isn't the only possible supernatural agent. You have your specific case for him, sure, but Christian creationism isn't the only game in town.

I'm sorry but naturalism is not a faith position and it certainly isn't religious.

When (if) a naturalist says "nature is all there is", it's not a denial but rather a positive definition of nature. "Nature" refers to the sum total of existence. Gods are left out because of a perceived lack of evidence in the currently observable parts of nature which suggests any gods exist.

If there is something beyond nature as currently understood, it's still part of nature and will be accepted by naturalists once it's discovered. If your God is "outside nature/time/causation" as many believers argue, His actions and influence must be within it or He is either nonexistent or irrelevant. Therefore we keep an eye out for this influence. Some folks think they see it everywhere, some never see a thing.

Faith confers a positive belief in a particular state of affairs, and protects it against criticism. Less argumentative Christians who have heard pro-evolution arguments and quietly reject them all based solely on Genesis 1:1 have faith.

A naturalist doesn't claim to know how anything really is, or really happened. The Big Bang for instance is a misnomer, because while rapid expansion likely occurred there's no consensus on whether the matter began to exist at that moment, came together and bounced, passed through itself or leaked in from somewhere else entirely.

Naturalists have theories and failing that they have hypotheses. They're constantly testing even the most implicitly accepted theories to find holes. That's how they improve them. Evolution is the best explanation for the diversity of life, it's not just "the way it happened".

Naturalism is not faith in the absence of gods. That's a clever but misleading semantic reversal and it ignores the distinction they themselves make. Naturalists (and of course atheists) lack faith in any particular god, and come to the resulting temporary conclusion that nature (that which exists) is responsible for so-called divine acts. It's a default.

As for religion, let's look at this idea of time and matter as God. Pantheists regard everything as part of God, but that's not what you mean. Do we need faith that matter/energy (interchangeable) and time (or something we perceive as such) exist? Not by any definition of faith that actually seeks to exclude something. We observe that time progresses, and matter persists (conservation). If we think backwards then time regresses, but matter still persists. Therefore eternal matter in an eternal past is the simplest possible extrapolation. That's not religious, it's logical. Any possible event of creation (which, in this view, the Big Bang was not) is not supported by observation or evidence.

We can settle on disagreement over angular momentum if you like, but just consider that not all elements in a rotating system have to have exactly the same angular momentum. The sum of the parts must equal the whole but if some parts spin faster, it breaks no rules for others to spin slower, or not at all, or even in the opposite direction. Think of the eddys between Jupiter's stripes: one side of every swirl is going against the larger current. On Earth, one side of a tornado is always against the wind and the planet's rotation.

Assumption A may lead to conclusions refuting A if A is false. This is the principle behind a reductio ad absurdum, an argument which willingly follows a suspect premise until the result contradicts itself. This can happen, sometimes unexpectedly, as long as there are other reliable assumptions independent of A.

When you claim naturalism is unfalsifiable, you're not just saying we can't prove it wrong. You're saying God can't either. God (in your estimation) can do anything; He couldn't think of a way to show Himself? To speak to us all at the same time, unambiguously? To leave sufficient evidence at the scene of a modern miracle that at least those skeptical of it end up in the minority? Naturalism is falsified for individuals all the time, that's how your arguments are supposed to make people believe. It just takes the right supernatural event to convince everybody at once.

Evolution in particular is falsifiable because the theory is specific. We have one less chromosome pair than our ape cousins, but losing a pair altogether is catastrophic for an individual. Two had to have fused together instead. They checked and found the fusion mark in our second pair. Had they not found one, the theory of evolution as it stands now would be false. A new one might spring up, but it would be different and it might even presume design.

In your explanation for people's reluctance to accept your case, you're using the false dilemma of God/no God which drives Pascal's Wager and "naturalism vs God". Again you ignore the possibility that another deity or equivalent exists instead and it dislikes Christians. I know you dismiss this, but your audience doesn't.

I would look very carefully at ICR's definition of a "creation scientist" if I were you. Since the Discovery Institute started looking for scientists who merely "dissent from Darwinism", they have come up with just over 700. And many of those aren't happy to be on the list. ICR ought to share their 10,000 with the DI.

My sources for the dark matter are in the words "stripe" and "filaments" in the other post. I know popular articles on science tend to be optimistic, but they also protect themselves with phrases like "may have found". Not these two. They have found.

Thanks for putting up your full creation story, readers will appreciate a change from the little fragments.

Points as I go through:
- I'd like a source for the 47-inch humerus, please.
- Yes, we now rigidly classify ancestors as either early humans or merely apes. The line of division is arbitrary; we picked it ourselves, for convenience. By definition, no ancestor was only part-human. What we do see is the apes getting more human-like, and the subsequent humans getting less apelike. And no fossil proves evolution, but a multitude of them supports it.
- How many generations back have they been counting average mutations? Knowledge of DNA itself is less than a century old. Got a source? Did they try any other creatures?
- Surprise, surprise, the diseases are evolving and diversifying, probably better than us. Natural selection is competitive, remember.
- If the solar system has formed naturally, exactly what would already be gone according to your view of entropy?
- The second law of thermodynamics does "work" in an open system, but in such a case it allows for unlimited local decreases in entropy (since there could be any increase outside of it). To cap these, you have to close the system.
- The fish didn't have to be buried in the process of eating or giving birth. They just had to have died while doing it. In each case, a fish is extremely vulnerable to attack at the time, and then it will keep its pose for as long as the burial takes.
- Text books depict a greater proportion of vertebrates because we're vertebrates and we find them more interesting. We can accept that invertebrates ruled for billions of years, and skip to the exciting developments later on.
- Skin-on fossils are rare because rapid burials are rare. An ordinary mudslide can accomplish the odd one.
- Okay, seriously, show me a credible human-dinosaur interaction in the fossil record. One of those would render all of this stuff moot and we could just stop.
- It's always possible that a species is mistakenly thought to be extinct. Like the coelacanth, it may have moved to an area where fossils are hard to get.
- Stephen Jay Gould's "geologic blink of an eye" was several million years, Jeremy. The Cambrian explosion is about when animals themselves evolved, hence the body diversity.
- Devil's Tower is igneous rock surrounded by sedimentary rock. Which erodes first?

There's a great deal more in there that I won't be able to reply to in the short term. I just don't know enough about geology or where to research it. I'll leave it to the readers while I learn more.

Finally, the "Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth" project, or RATE, is a joint initiative of ICR and the Creation Research Society. It exists solely to discredit radiometric dating for the purposes of two groups with "Creation" in the title. So...yeah, creation lab. Does Humphreys make that clear?

Feel free to keep holding forth on the flood. I'm happy for stuff to go up here even if I can't respond. I may receive help from the ether.

I want to give you some

I want to give you some quick answers to references and questions. ..
*a Museum in Texas has the 47 inch femur. http://www.mtblanco.com

*DNA mutation rates
http://www.answersingenesis.org/tj/v12/i1/eve.asp

This articles clears the differences between what was found and what it means. This information is consistent with the bible but doesn’t prove the bible. As we both know neither could be proved.

RATE Group
1. Yes I agree the Main (if not the ONLY) reason for the RATE project was to test the assumptions of radiometric decay! We already know it gives unreliable dates ranging from 100's of thousands to 100's of millions of years in the same rock.

A logical question to ask is can you trust any of the dates if they don't agree with each other.
3. Even evolutionist don’t trust these dates. Dates are often changed to fit the theory. And ultimately all dates are compared with the Geologic column as the definition of truth. You could say the Geologic column is the Bible of the evolutionist.
Here are some quotes from evolutionist to support my statements.

“Ever since William Smith at the beginning of the 19th century, fossils have been and still are the best and most accurate method of dating and correlating the rocks in which they occur. Apart from very ‘modern’ examples, which are really archaeology, I can think of no cases of radioactive decay being used to date fossils.”

Ager, Derek V., “Fossil Frustrations,” New Scientist, vol. 100 (November 10, 1983), p. 425.

“Radiometric dating would not have been feasible if the geologic column had not been erected first.”
O’Rourke, J. E., “Pragmatism versus Materialism in Stratigraphy,” American Journal of Science, vol. 276 (January 1976), p. 54

The troubles of the radiocarbon dating method are undeniably deep and serious. Despite 35 years of technological refinement and better understanding, the underlying assumptions have been strongly challenged, and warnings are out that radiocarbon may soon find itself in a crisis situation. Continuing use of the method depends on a “fix-it-as-we-go” approach, allowing for contamination here, fractionation there, and calibration whenever possible… It should be no surprise, then, that fully half of the dates are rejected. The wonder is, surely, that the remaining half come to be accepted . . . No matter how “useful” it is, though, the radiocarbon method is still not capable of yielding accurate and reliable results. There are gross discrepancies, the chronology is uneven and relative, and the accepted dates are actually selected dates.
Robert E. Lee, “Radiocarbon Age in Error,” Anthropological Journal of Canada, Vol. 19, No. 3, pgs. 9, 29.
My favorite line “ the accepted dates are actually selected dates.”

In case you didn’t know You can’t date sedimentary rock. There are too many different rocks, and elements in them. So they use the Geologic column. “how do you know the age of the fossil… by the rocks they come from, how do you know the age of the rock, by the fossils they contain.
Again the final published dates are from the column. This is circular reasoning. No proof of age to begin with. No fossil has a date stamped on it. 

2. Another goal of the RATE group was to determine if decay was accelerated in the past. Which might explain why we get “old” dates to begin with. This is what was demonstrated with the polonium halos, and Helium diffusion results.

3. The lab that did the work was not in any way affiliated with the creation movement.
According to ICR’s website “The experimenter was one of the world's foremost experts in Helium diffusion measurements in minerals.” “it was a blind test” (the lab didn’t know who was asking for the measurements). Their predictions where published in their 1st rate book before the results came back! They basically said if the earth is 6000 years old this is the predicted rate. If the rock is 1.5 billion yrs (as given by tradition methods) then the other is predicted.
This is why we are so excited about it! The results were published in the second rate book.
The whole point of using an independent lab was to keep from being accused of faking the numbers. According to a presentation I watched the other day that lab even published a statement saying “though we disagree with the conclusions made by ICR they stand by there results.” It was a blind test. They didn’t know it was a creation team that sent the rocks to be tested. I am trying to find the name of the lab now. It is possible they don’t want there name listed on ICR’s website. But I am sure it is listed in the RATE book if not online. I will check the book store sometime soon. Until then we can leave this one on hold.
One last point. According to any evolutionist the results must be wrong for some reason or another because of the assumption of an old earth.

In reality (just as a comment) I don’t think the age of the earth is the biggest problem for evolution. But I do believe if it could be demonstrated beyond any question or assumption that the earth is 6000 years old all of evolution would be destroyed. That being the case (if I was on the other side) I would defend the “old earth” with all the religious fervor I had. It has to be old for evolution to be true. No one believes it all evolved in 6000 years that’s within recorded history.

Nature or God
I understand the logic you are trying to use with the Naturalism VS God question but that just doesn't cover it.
The definition of Religion “A set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe.”

You could easily say Evolution/naturalism is a model of beliefs concerning the cause nature and ultimate purpose of the universe.

The Random House College Dictionary, 1982. Rev. ed.
Edited by Jess Stein, p. 1114
According to the supreme court Creation science is. Chief Justice Rienquist & Justice Scalla, "We have no basis on the record to conclude that creation-science need be anything other than a collection of scientific data supporting the theory that life abruptly appeared on the earth." Edwards vs. Aguillard, Dissent.
I would not argue that Creation is “more” scientific then evolution. Even though I believe that. However I would say they are equally scientific and equally religious. In that we look at the same facts (fossils etc) and based on our assumptions conclude God must have created or Nature must have created itself.
The first law of Thermodynamics Says "matter can't be created or destroyed". This is a LAW of science. We Know for a fact Matter can't create itself. So where did it come from? This is why many Humanist don’t like the Big Bang as presented now because it says there was a beginning. Requiring a “first cause”
2. The 2nd law say basically usable energy is running irreversibly down. Stars blow up things wear out, we get old and die. Nothing is improving every thing is getting worst.

Here is a quote on thermodynamics. Isaac Asimov, "Another way of stating the second law then is 'The universe is constantly getting more disorderly!' Viewed that way we can see the second law all about us. We have to work hard to straighten a room, but left to itself it becomes a mess again very quickly and very easily. Even if we never enter it, it becomes dusty and musty. How difficult to maintain houses, and machinery, and our own bodies in perfect working order: how easy to let them deteriorate. In fact, all we have to do is nothing, and everything deteriorates, collapses, breaks down, wears out, all by itself–and that is what the second law is all about.", Smithsonian Institution Journal, June, 1970, p. 6

This means two things.
1. it had to be up from which it could run down. It had to be ordered to become disordered
2. The universe can't be infinitely old or it would have long sense run down to ultimate heat death and disorder. Both creationist and evolutionist agree this will happen one day.
These are undisputed facts of science.

I agree that the God of the bible is not necessarily the only possible creator. There are people now who think other god's created. Science could never tell us "who" the creator is, those are philosophical questions. Which we could talk about in another forum if you want to know why I think the Christian God is the “correct one”. But the 1st and 2nd law demand a “creator” that is not apart of nature. Something “super” natural, or outside of nature. That is basic logical thinking.

The law of cause and effect says "no affect is without a cause and no effect can be greater then it's cause". So you can't argue that God might be apart of nature because nature can't possibly be the "1st cause". And if the God if the bible is true He could not have created himself. Thus creation can NOT be greater then the creator (something super natural). One person asked me “well who created God”. I think you know the answer but for the readers this is the same as asking “what does the color red smell like?” It means they don’t understand the meaning of the word they are using. If God exist he must be eternal. Thus not requiring a cause. There are only two possibilities I am aware of. There are an infinite number of gods that preceded and created the god’s that followed requiring each God to be a little less powerful then the former or There is one Infinite God who is all powerful that created.

Here is some basic cause and effect reasoning that should be logically to most. However I know it will still be rejected by some. Not because of the logic but because of the implications of the logic. (Implications like If God made this world he owns it, he makes the rules etc)

*The creator of time must be eternally. (Cause and effect demands this)
* the creator of life must be living. (no effect can be greater then it’s cause)
* the creator of all information must be infinitely intelligent.
* I could go on but you get the point I am trying to make.

I think it is unreasonable to think something could begin without a cause. And the universe has been shown to have a beginning. Even if you try and Go back before the Big Bang you still need a beginning.

I am glad you mentioned the list from Discovery Ins.
The list of creation scientist is different from the list of those that “dissent from Darwin”.

This group does not want to be grouped with “creation” scientist. You said yourself it is a big jump to go from complete naturalism to the God of the Bible. I completely agree with that statement. And these guys are “in-between” if I can describe it that way. They don’t necessarily believe the bible but they agree Darwin is not enough.

Some of them I know are not creation scientist. I have not be able to find one creation scientist on the list. At least I haven’t been able to find one on the list that I know to be a creation scientist and I could list 30 or so names myself.

They simply disagree with the statement made in a PBS special on evolution that “basically ALL” scientist believe Darwin explained information or the complexity of life we see today. And “their list” is a testament against that statement. Up to 700 names now. If you have a moment please read there statement and you will see what I mean.

http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/faq.php (what does it say and mean)

http://www.discovery.org/a/3347 (article about the list)
evolutionary biologist and textbook author Dr. Stanley Salthe is one of the more interesting names on the list.

The 10,000 creation scientist are those practicing in a field of science who believes the bibles interpretation of creation is the best explanation for the universe and life based on what we see around us. Yes ultimately we base our model on the bible, just as evolution is based undeniably on the philosophy of naturalism. Laws of science require a creator.

I will use the word Bias if you don’t like the word faith.

4. The intelligent design Group is working hard to keep their work separate from creationist. And I think that is a factor. I would even be willing to not talk about the age issue if it meant both groups would work together. Basically ID groups says Darwin's mechanism is not sufficient to explain the complexity of life. Someone or something Organized it in such a way as to make it work. They imply there is a god but do nothing to explain “who” or what God did it. And I agree we can’t say based on science who the creator is.
*Creationist says the bible has the best explanation of life and we explain the facts based on that.

There is so much that could be said. At least this one is shorter then the last one. :)

Dinos and man together

Here is the reference for the Dinosaurs and man together in the fossil record.

You said

"Okay, seriously, show me a credible human-dinosaur interaction in the fossil record. One of those would render all of this stuff moot and we could just stop."

How about not one but 10 normal human skeletons found in the same layer decokata sandstone as Dinosaur national monument. Which is full of dinosaur bones.
And before you assume they were a recently buried (as some has suggested but have not even been to the site) have a look at this video by Dr Don Patton (the discoverer) and see for yourself the process by which it was found. and the pictures of the bones still in the ground. They were not buried 4o plus feet down in the ground.

If you are interested in the truth I would listen to Dr Patton's presentation and see the pictures before I listen to someone that hasn't been to the site But assumes it can't be true.

article and pictures
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/malachite-man.htm
video
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/patton-malachite-man-part1.ram

Thanks Jeremy.

Good stuff here. There's far more than we'll be able to resolve between us. Folks, feel free to back up or debunk Jeremy's material here. It's a real treasure trove.

I really had no idea how many creation museums there are in America; Ken Ham's one gets all the publicity.

I can guess without looking (though I will look) that there will be an extensively-written case supporting, and several rejecting, each of the fossils you're on about: the giant thigh bone, the human-dinosaur footprints, etc. I know why you think they're not accepted by mainstream science: reluctance to accept God. Okay. But what do you propose to do about that? Your speeches may convince some people, but how do you and other creationists intend to bring mainstream science around? Force of majority? Prove a particular flagship miracle? What?

Yep, radiocarbon dating has had issues. That's why about 18 other kinds of radiometric dating are in use. I've been through the margins of error required for any of them to be inaccurate enough to allow for 6000-year-old dinosaurs. I agree with you nevertheless that proving a young earth would render the theory of evolution useless.

You really ought to have finished that definition of religion: “A set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs." A Creator, as it says here, is expected the majority of the time. Further, naturalism is not at all concerned with the ultimate purpose of the universe. Purpose implies will.

You're lucky you're not actually making a legal statement when you quote Rehnquist and Scalia as representatives of the Supreme Court. Creation science is not science according to the Supreme Court; just the opposite. It is merely science according to two of the nine judges at the time. That can happen in a body which does not require a unanimous vote.

You mis-apply the first law of thermodynamics. Matter cannot be created, let alone create itself. In order to posit a Creator, you immediately have to break that law, so how can you use it to rule anything else out? The Big Bang, as I have tried to say, need not have been a creation at all but simply a major event in an eternal history. This is in fact my opinion. You do not need a beginning at all. If not for God, why the universe?

Asimov's expression of the second law of thermodynamics is incomplete. The universe cannot get less disorderly, but it may stay level. It isn't losing energy (as I've said elsewhere, how can energy leave the universe?) so any increase in entropy may be balanced out by a decrease elsewhere. Transfer of energy allows exchange of local entropy, as the sun's light allows life to flourish. Compare that to Creation: starting with nothing, you get one massive decrease in entropy. And then you've got to apply the same laws to the Creator.

You're not abiding by these laws, Jeremy, you're just choosing how to break them in a way which suits your bias. I'm trying to keep them intact.

I do understand that the DI wants to distance itself from open creation science. And you're right, not only are many on the list not creationists but some are evolutionists trying to get taken off. I still think they would have found more scientists willing to own up to a position less extreme than full creationism if there are ten thousand full-blown creation scientists.

Again, thanks for the references.

the 1st and 2nd law are

the 1st and 2nd law are applied correctly in this content. God doesn't "break the law" HE CREATES THE LAW to conserve what he made. You seem to be assuming God is apart of his creation. He can't be. He can interact with it, but he is not part of it.

If you build a toy car and "wind it up" useful or free energy runs down as the car goes forward. No laws are broken by the creator starting this process. You the creator set and limit the laws, you are not apart of what you made. This I believe is the best explanation.

If matter can't create itself what created it. And of course energy is not lost that’s the 1st law. USABLE/FREE energy is lost that’s the 2nd law. The definition is perfect the way it is.

When you burn something the matter is converted to heat light and ashes. The heat spreads out evenly (eventually) through out the universe. You can never use that heat again for "useful" work. This is what the second law is about. The first law says it is all conserved. Again the universe can not be infinitely old because we still have useful energy. Meaning there has been enough time for it to run down. Just do a search for "Heat Death" and maybe that will help. Heat Death is the point where all useable energy is gone and no other useful work can be done. All lights burn out, all motion stops… this is heat death. Even on Wikipedia the concept is explained pretty well. And that site is loaded with evolution. This is taught in a basic physics class. I understand it well and My application is perfect.

The universe has a beginning and requires a first cause. This fact alone has lead many evolutionist to suggest the universe begin from nothing!

I think this is crazy but it is okay if that’s what they want to believe. Just don’t teach my child that it is a proven fact. I have on a copy of a science journal right here. I will post a scanned copy of it on my website. Just incase you say I am quoting out of context as you suggested with the Judge.

http://createddinos.com/fromnothing.html

We all agree on the empirical science. It's the interpretation that gets us in trouble.
People are allowed to believe whatever they want to, but don't call it science.
Alan Guth knows more then both of us combined.
I am not making this stuff up. Scientists (on both sides) know the universe has a beginning.

So the new question is which one takes more Faith/Bias God or Nothing?

We can leave this one up to the readers to consider on there own if you still disagree. But please readers search for Heat death of the Universe. And these conclusions will become clear. If you want to believe the universe is infinite that is okay too but the 2nd law says different.

Main stream science/ Majority

As to main stream science I agree with you that the majority at least in part if not a whole believe in Macro Evolution, the Big Bang etc.
People have a tendency to believe what ever they are taught. That works on both sides. We take new information and compare it to what we already believe. Then decide if it disagrees with that it most not be true.
School books are loaded with evolution. And history is full of ideas that scientist use to “all agree” on that were wrong! We use to think the Sun went around the earth, we use to think if you take out someone’s blood it would make them better it was called the doctrine of humors. We use to think big rocks fall faster then small rocks. Scientists use to believe a lot of things we think are dumb today.

As to how I would change there minds I think the issue personally is beyond science. My goal is to show people the creation model fits the facts and show the weaknesses of using naturalism to define science. I want to be clear though I do think to study science we must use things we can observe and measure today, rates processes etc. But we must be careful when we try to extrapolate these rates and processes indefinitely into the past. These concepts could never be proven, and there are infinite possible excepts to the rule.

And finally you keep saying that some are evolutionist and want to be removed from the list. DI is not difficult to get in contact with, and anyone can be removed, or added at will. The wording of the agreement is plain enough before they signed it. "we disagree with the claim that Darwinism explains the complexity of life". At least that's my summary of it.

I have no don’t Darwinist could get a longer list of PhD’s . This wasn’t the point.

Most working science don't care enough to get involved on either side of the issue. It was only a response to the PBS special airing here in America claiming all scientists believe Marco Evolution.

I would agree some things we will not be able to resolve. My hope was only that both sides get a chance to present a case. And I think you have been very fair in your questions and presenting all I have posted.

I even believe parts of evolution should be taught in school. I am against teaching lies in school. And I believe only the facts should be presented leaving out the humanist, and christian interpretation of the facts, or presenting both interpretations of the facts.

I have learned a lot about Athiestism (even though we haven't talked about it directly) and a lot about why I believe, and why others believe what they do.

Dino’s and Man.
As I thought you haven’t looked at the video or articles but you assume "it can't be true" And many others do the same.
My thought on that is…

Wouldn’t you want to know if there’s a chance you where wrong???

Dr Patton Does an excellent job of verifying his discovery. Abundantly less has been accepted in favor of evolution. Even fragments and single bones have been offered as evidence, Dates changed without question. But Dr Patton finds 10 mostly complete skeletons and it has to be wrong.

Come on man check it out for yourself. Then look for evolutionary answers. Make the decision based on what you see and not on what you already believe. As you said earlier in our discussion.

Ultimately we decide what we want to be true. But at least consider it.

Are there any other issues or questions about the creation model that you or others have? Geology can be tough but we can go over other things if you like.

And where are you located if you don't mind me asking. I am in Georgia. The United States of course.

And on...

So God made the laws after he created everything...were they in effect during of the Fifth Day, after the creation of plants and during the creation of animals but before the creation of humans? If so, was he breaking them then? If not, how did the plants' molecular structure last before thermodynamics existed? And when God reversed the entropy in Jesus' body to bring him back to life, or when Jesus multiplied the loaves and the fishes, how did that hold to the laws?

As I said, even if a god is outside of the system, its actions are either within it or irrelevant, and must be held to the same laws as everything else. It's pointless to hold any non-theistic position to these laws if your position regards them as malleable, or able to be pre-dated by an action.

Of course we can never catch all of the heat and energy our world emits, and much of it is radiating out to the edge of the cosmos. Maybe, since it then can't escape, it is doing work at the edge. You do need something drastic to reclaim that energy for the middle though. The whole universe coming back together to one spot, like what possibly happened before the Big Bang, would suffice.

The prime cosmological question concerning the future is whether the universe will continue outward and reach heat death or return to the singularity in a Big Crunch, and possibly bounce. If the latter is true, perhaps it's already happened. The hypothesis of the cyclical universe has therefore always allowed for time before the Big Bang, and after the reverse event.

Instead, this universe might not be cyclical at all, and be running down for good. What if it creates another universe in the process? What if ours came about in the same way by a previous universe? If this universe has a beginning, perhaps it's not really all there is? This is where the idea of a multiverse comes in. It's completely speculative, but the objects suggested are simply multiple instances of an object confirmed to exist (a universe) rather than an object never before confirmed (a god). That's why I prefer the multiverse to a god, if this is a universe doomed to heat death.

The choice we face, Jeremy, is not God vs nothing. That's another false dilemma. It is God vs anything else. When Guth proposes that the universe came from nothing (full article here),
he's nice enough to explain how in great detail. As you will agree, however, no amount of intelligence might stop him from being wrong. If so, there's still a multitude of multiple-universe models battling it out.

Accepted science does change. The theory of evolution itself is constantly getting more detailed as the behaviour of various populations becomes known. What does not tend to happen is a theory going back to a previous state that's any more than about a century old. If a major model changes, it's because enough evidence has accumulated contradicting it that once it does change, there's a mountain of empirical support for it from the get-go. The accepted young earth hypothesis held out as long as it could. It's ruled and been toppled once already. Now that it's out of favour, it gets as many appeals as it wants but it's got a long way to go. Among its strategies, as you say, is to redefine science itself to suit its needs.

Looks like I was off about the Dissent from Darwinism list. Those who wanted to be taken off have been, like Robert C. Davidson. It's still small though. I might as well drop it and ask the direct question: where does the ICR get its figure of ten thousand creation scientists?

Oi, I said I would read the links, didn't I? My time for this pursuit is limited, especially after writing here.

- Dr Patton's Malachite Man find (that's your link) is not without dissent, especially by the next guy who investigated the site, John Marwitt. The colour of the bones for instance is likely just that, a surface discolouration. Much of what Patton says in the video you've already quoted here, concerning radiometric dating, marine invertebrates and the fossil record in general.
- The Mt Blanco museum's giant femur (not humerus - my mistake) is a sculpture. It is in fact modeled on a Malachite Man female's femur, on an increased scale. They never had a giant bone, they just worked from a story by a Mr Jack Wagner of his travels in south-east Turkey. The whole thing is plaster and hearsay. Now if you'd found a surviving bone in Turkey...
- Read Loeb's actual New Scientist article on star formation, rather than relying on AiG's quotes from it. The article does in fact present a potential way to solve the pressure problem via chemical coolants among the raw materials. Here's a very well-referenced external response, while I'm at it.
- I was researching individual claims from Psarris' presentation and discovered something: Venus' rotation isn't retrograde at all. It's simply slower than its orbital rotation around the Sun. It's being turned faster in one direction by its overall movement than it can turn itself in the other. So all that had to happen was that its own rotation slowed down.

I'm glad I went through that lot (I will continue to do so on my own time) and I'm sorry I took so long to get to it.

A few final things:

- It'll take you two minutes to learn how to use HTML links (the a href kind) and they function in comments here.
- I'm in Brisbane, Australia.
- No need to capitalise "atheism".
- And please, what is your site's URL?

New Page 1 Interesting

New Page 1

Interesting stuff. Glad you checked the femur. I didn't know it was a "model"
of a discovery made somewhere else. I will look into it further to see if there
is some more solid evidence. It seems pointless to me to debate over things that
can't be checked or verified. We could both just write out claims. So I never
intend to use claims like that. I have read about other discoveries of large
bones but that was the one I could go back to quickly.
So as to the possible formation of stars I think that topic is moot now, as you
describe it. You can't prove a universe negative. "it is impossible for a star
to form" or "our universe can't be part of a bigger universe". I am simply
saying it hasn't been observe and doesn't qualify as a scientific theory. It
could Easily have been created by God. Which reminds me of something else. Why
do evolutionist get so worked up about dinosaurs living with man. You can't
prove a universe negative "no man has ever seen a dinosaur". All it takes is one
man and one dinosaur. And you must be honest and say that even if evolutionist
accept evidence that man interacted with dinosaurs belief in naturalism would
not go away. It would simply modify to fit the new facts. Or it would be called
the "exception to the rule".
To answer your questions. I want to use the same example used above. You
being the designer of a "windup" car could go back and add parts. This doesn't
break the rules. However Miracles do break the rules! Examples walking on water,
braking the bread, raising the dead. And I absolutely agree with you! I want to
point out here, before we get to far down the wrong road, that we are starting
to use similar arguments about things neither of us can prove. Clearly, an
all-powerful God as described in the Bible would be capable of doing miracles.
Thus, by merely assuming that miracles are impossible, you have already
dismissed the possibility that the Bible is true. This argument is circular.
It's the same as arguing that the Bible is false because I think the Bible is
false. These things may seem counter-intuitive, but they are not illogical. They
are merely a psychological problem for some. So I agree that miracles break the
rules but God is breaking the rules here to show his power over his creation
which is what you asked for earlier. But getting into whither you can trust the
bible's accounts is a different subject.
This was not the intent that I had. Only really to cover the things that all
agree on (empirical or measurable stuff) and try to show the bibles
interpretation fit the facts better. My website is
here.
I plan to read the article you posted sometime on Monday about the "Green bones"
refutation.
Australia. That interesting. Ken Ham is from there. What a differences of
opinion you guys here. Sorry American humor.
Some final remarks,
I have an article I wrote on my
website here
about dinosaurs and man interacting. I think so will find it interesting at
least.
 
Naturalism and humanism are both deeply religious. And I hope that people
will realize that no amount of science will over turn these beliefs. What I
would like to see happen is as people read this they may consider God is not a
impossible, folklore that people use to believe. But that we all start with a
bias. And both will defend what they already believe to be true. Coming
ultimately to the conclusions that are most comfortable to them.
Also to recommend two books written by a former atheist.
The Case for the creator by Lee Strobel (an old earth creationist now)
The case for Christ also by Lee Strobel.
Thank you so much for all the information and challenges to the creation model.
This has been a great experience. I will check back here regularly to see if any
thing new comes up.
Thanks Again
Jeremy
www.createddinos.com
 

Just for clarity sake. One a

Just for clarity sake. One a few things I mentioned.

When I say Bias I mean, some start with the bias "there is no God" and then after looking at the evidence come to conclusions that agree with that bias. "Their is no god so the stars must have formed on their own through some process of development"
We start with the bias "there is a God" and we look at the evidence and come to conclusions that agree with that "God created the stars complete from nothing"

When I believed in the old earth I thought all scientist where unbiased, and whatever they said must be true.
But then I realized that no one can be completely unbiased.

How could anyone make a decision at all with out first assuming something?
And no fact speaks for itself. We all look at them and determine what they mean to us based on what we assume to start with. I don't think anyone disagrees that a flood would create fossils and lay down layers. What they disagree with is was there a global flood at all.

Time is not a substance you can measure. So no evidence could prove the age of the earth. YEC often use uniformitarism assumptions to show the earth can't be billions of years old.
You said there are lots of ways to measure age. And I agree there are hundreds of ways to estimate age. Answers in Genesis has a list of over 100 processes that can be used to estimate the age of the earth. less then 10% give an age of billions of years.

On a bit less

Oh, www.createddinos.com is yours. Thankyou, I'll go through it.

A scientific theory does not need to have been observed in action, exactly. It just needs to be supported by observational or experimental evidence, which is not the same thing. The observation of star precursor clouds (as opposed to the observation of the remnants of supernovae, which are actually seen to expand) is evidence supporting this theory. You have your objections, and so may some astrophysicists, but they don't render this evidence invalid just yet.

No, you can't prove a universe negative, but you can prove a local (Earth) negative if you can account for all parties involved. The millions of years between the last dinosaurs in the Cretaceous period and the first humans in the Paleolithic, if accurate, really do mean that living dinosaurs and living humans never interacted on Earth. If you want to talk about unrelated humans riding other dinosaurs on some other planet, fine, that can't be ruled out. The only way to establish it here, however, is to either find (and successfully defend) a positive example like Malachite Man, or make out that those millions of years never happened. This is of course your position.

By invoking the supposed miracles, I am simply saying that this god breaks the rules even after they are set. You now agree explicitly. This is the crux of the problem: your model of the universe, with the addition of Yahweh, has to allow these rules to be broken. It gives a comprehensive if not detailed explanation of how this is possible - that He is all-powerful and not beholden to the laws He imposed on the universe - but it still breaks the rules. And then you attempt to disqualify all other models on the grounds that they break the rules in their own ways (which I argue they do not necessarily do), dismissing in advance any non-theistic explanations of how they might plausibly do so. It's a questionable comparison to make.

Yep, Ken Ham gets the lion's share of creationist publicity in Australia, even though he's not based here anymore. Public access TV here in Brisbane has a Muslim show which plays Christian creationist videos now and then. They're compatible with the Muslim view because they're smart enough to simply refer to "God".

I'm familiar with Lee Strobel, though not with those two books. I responded to one of his talks about Christ in another question.

Is Strobel the one who gave you the idea that naturalism is religious? I bet you're not a fan of Richard Dawkins, but have you heard his definition of "religious" which he happily applies to himself? It's about two minutes into this excellent lecture. If that's what you mean, fine, but it broadens the definition to the point where it's hardly common ground at all.

Everyone is indeed biased in some way, but someone can be biased and still right. Scientists are sharply aware of bias, and the whole peer review process was created to counter it. It's still possible to start with a bias and have it shattered as you go along. I think every scientist dreams of the day when they turn their own views upside down. Perhaps one will someday find God in some undeniable way, and religion and science will merge in a collaborative ecstasy. Or not.

It has indeed been fascinating and educational, Jeremy, and you can bet the subject will come up again in other questions. Do us a courtesy and write a quick note if or when you reproduce this exchange on CreatedDinos. Thanks.

I am not sure I understand

I am not sure I understand what

I am not sure I understand what you mean about God breaking
the rules. Let me explain in another way to be more clear then have you respond.

A computer programmer designs a program to function a
certain way. The program itself could never break the rules set up by the
programmer. I am suggested that God is able as a programmer is able to alter his
program. and there doesn't seem to be any real feasible explanation for nature
making itself.
 I am basically asking you the same question you asked me
but from the other side. You say why does it have to be God? I am saying Why not
God? Why such an objection to the concept of the divine. The programmer
certainly could change something to fit whatever he desires for the program to
do. Including adding new features like animals and plants.
Maybe we are thinking about it in different ways. But I
think it is logically to conclude that such a system as the universe which
certainly has laws that govern it would have a law maker. So why discount the
possibility that God created if it is a possible explanation?
What I am trying to conclude is “God creating” would fit
all we see and it is only ignored because we aren't satisfied with "God made
it”.
You said (and we agree on this) that God is the simplest
explanation. I do however recognize you were disagreeing with my use of
Occam’s razor.
It states that the explanation of any

phenomenon
should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating those
that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory

hypothesis
or

theory
.
Rather then assume the universe is infinite beyond a Big
Bang (which may have come for other Bang's etc) I am saying God is the simplest
explanation for origins. That doesn't change the way we do empirical science. It
only effects our worldview. What you believe about origins effects how you live
your life and what you think about life itself. it is not difficult to make
anything agree with what one already believes. I will use one more full quote to
explain what I think is happening in the science community.

"We take the side
of science in spite
of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs,
in spite
of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life,
in spite
of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated
just-so-stories, because we
have a prior commitment,
a commitment to materialism.

It is
not
that the methods and institutions of
science
somehow compel
us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world But,
on the contrary, that we are forced by a prior adherence to material
causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that
produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive,
no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, hat materialism
is an absolute, for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door"
Richard
Lewontin, “Billions and Billions of Demons,” The New York Review,
January 9, 1997, p. 31
I think his message is clear
even when the evidence doesn't fit "we can not allow a divine foot in
the door".  If you teach it this way the next generation
comes up believing science is naturalism.  Then they go on to
interpret it that way. and in just a few generations you get a majority
whom by default must believe in a naturalist interpretation because "we
can not allow a divine foot in the door".
I watched your video on
"what is an atheist". I understand better what you think about belief,
in that you say "we are without belief". But I only want to quibble on
this once more by saying that since we can never prove either don't you
have to believe something about origins? You can't know, therefor you
must believe something. It is impossible to be without belief in
something, God or any number of other things even pantheism is belief. I
understand Christians believe God, But by removing God you must believe
nature has the ability to create itself. 
I get the idea of
naturalism as religion first from Dr Donald Chittick in a presentation
he gave at a creation conference. Then Dr Henry Morris's book "The long
war against God" explains in great detail how evolutionism is a
religion. But almost all creationist call evolution a religion so I hear
it often. I don't remember Lee calling evolutionism or naturalism a
religion though he may have.
Even evolutionist have
called evolution a religion. My favorite quote on religion...

Michael Ruse, "Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more
than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular
religion-a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with its meaning
and morality…Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the
beginning, and is true of evolution still today." National Post,
5/13/2000, p.B-3.
Even the courts of America
have named atheism as a religion. Court rules atheism a religion:
"A federal court of appeals ruled yesterday Wisconsin prison officials
violated an inmate's rights because they did not treat atheism as a
religion. "Atheism is [the inmate's] religion…even though it expressly
rejects a belief in a supreme being," the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals
said." August 20, 2005, WorldNetDaily.com
I have read a little of
Dawkins book the blind watchmaker. Which I found interesting. On the
very first page he says
Biology is
the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been
designed for a purpose." The Blind Watchmaker, p.1
I am aware of his teaching.
From our perspective He would be like the pastor/Bishop of atheism. I
also know he is a strong anti-creationist.
I also watched the
presentation you sent by him. He is right about two things. He does
believe in a god of nature. And he is also right that no one would go to
a church where a lump of coal is God. :)
I will send a message here
if I post this on my website. I just have to decide where I would put
it, being that it is almost 40 pages long. I want to present it in a way
that people actually try to read it all. My predictions remain the same
"some will believe, some will walk away and others will ask for more on
this matter". But we all will find out one day if we be right or wrong.

I want to address one more
thing you mentioned several pages ago. You said "why doesn't God just
come down and prove himself". If God is who he says he is He has nothing
to prove. Creation is proof. It's like me says "I have never seen
President Bush so I don't believe he is real" he would never feel
compelled to come and appease my arrogant request. I had to first come
to Him then he reveals himself to me (Jesus that is). And I have never
been the same since. You don't have to "fall out" or see a bright light.
But ask any born again Christian and they will tell you  it is
something you know is done when it happens. I could list many things God
has done for me but God doesn't want anyone to come for what he can do
for them. But what he already did for them.
I can't say it enough
thanks again for hearing me out, and discussing this openly on your
website.
Jeremy Fielding
Should someone have a
question they don't want to post here my email is
[email protected]

 
 
 
 

I am not sure I understand

I am not sure I understand what

I finally had a chance to read the article by glen kuban on Dr Patton's find.
He doesn't present anything inpressive when you read through his angry wording
he is saying this is the same as a old find. Dr Patton points out the old find
in his video and the new. He has pictures of both on his website and Kuben is
comparing pictures that aren't important. Dr Pattons is showing both.

However I will say we can't really argue much from a disagreement others are
having. Kuban and Patton have a bad history. Dr Patton says kuban went out to a
site and destroyed evidence after he heard Dr Patton give a presentation on new
evidence at the foot print site. We both know they have reasons to say the other
is wrong so I just recommend those following to at least
watch Dr Patton's video
scroll down to malachite man then decide what what was found comparing both
sides of the story. Dr Patton gives reasons in the video for the "complaints
given by Kuban.

And on......

I understand how you see God in relation to the universe in this context, but temporarily changing or "reprogramming" the rules in order to achieve that which they forbid is just another way of circumventing them. It says the same thing as any other hypothesis which requires this: there is a way around the rules if you have the right qualities.

In God's case the qualities are omnipotence and omniscience, which outrank mere familiarity with the "program". In some Big Bang and even black hole models the quality is extreme density and the idea that it may invalidate certain laws of physics near the centre of mass. In superstring theory it's the feature of seven or eight spatial dimensions on top of the familiar three.

As for the universe creating itself, it's another false dilemma to compare that alone with divine Creation. The hypothesis of eternal time posits that the universe was never created at all, and maintains a balance of entropy to stay within the second law of thermodynamics. The multiverse hypotheses (there are many) suggest this universe emerged from another universe, and that the whole group of universes is collectively eternal and perhaps physically infinite.

God does look like the simplest explanation, and I would have said as much, until you then have to explain God. Here, Jeremy, is "why such an objection to the concept of the divine", and why we disagree on usage of Ockham's razor. The razor as plainly stated treats all assumptions as equal; a god such as Yahweh is a single assumption which encompasses the most complex, exotic entity imaginable without relying on positive evidence in the slightest. The fact that Ockham himself was a Fransiscan friar may help to explain the razor's bias towards fewer, larger assumptions.

Having made this one gigantic assumption, we are expected to simply stop. We're meant to accept the existence of this enormous thing and, rather than investigate its nature and origins like we do for everything else, merely ponder its intentions as we defend it against doubters. Taken as a scientific explanation for anything, it is unique to the point where we have to fight over whether it is a scientific explanation.

With your invocation of the old "lawmaker" chestnut, we move at last from the cosmological argument to the transcendental argument. My responses to this are much the same: just because the source of the laws isn't known doesn't mean it's a god, or that they have a source at all. I've gone into more depth elsewhere.

On another topic, I'm fine with atheism being a religion for legal purposes because it gives atheists a chance at the same privileges as the religious: tax exemptions for its organisations, protection from discrimination and so on. (Not that it's actually gotten that far.) I'd prefer of course that people legally without a religion could have these things on secular grounds and religions didn't get special treatment at all, but until that happens I'll take what I can get.

You seem to equate a belief with an opinion if you think nobody can be without one on any subject they consider. It just means your definition of belief is broader than mine. If you'd also classify every "belief" as religious faith, then everyone's religious to you and that's that. It doesn't stop us from discussing the relative merits of each "belief".

You say God has nothing to prove, and then you say Creation is proof. You have this tremendous list of archaeological, geological, astronomical and Biblical claims, each of which is supposed to be a proof of God in its own roundabout way, and when they are not accepted you rule out anything more direct happening because God can't be bothered. You may be dead right, but I hope you see why your explanation inspires skepticism.

Thankyou for not going into your personal experiences of God and Jesus. Such is the evidential value of such experiences that they amount to little more than preaching, and I'd rather keep that to a minimum.

Again, nice discussing with you.

Wow, I haven't been back in

Wow, I haven't been back in a while and look what happens! I'm glad to have set off such a lengthy discussion with my question and when I have time I'll have to actually read it all :)

I may have to copy+paste it into wordpad or something: grey text on a white background is not exactly the optimal pair of colours for lengthy reading :)