Both the “natural” sciences and theology are seeking the true statement. The purpose statement of both are completely integrate-able. In fact, there are many who have made a point of showing the obvious and perhaps necessary connections between good theological thinking and the roots of good scientific thinking. The two paradigms are not contradictory. For centuries, this has been the case.
For the believer, all truth should be seen as God’s truth. God, if anything, is a God of truth.
So, if something is an accurate statement… remember that the very concept of truth is sourced in Him. It doesn’t matter how and who uncovers something that is true… if it is true, then the ultimate source of that is God.
However, as impressed as I have been by the general lack of scientific knowledge, I was just as impressed by the profound lack of biblical understanding that people who claim to believe in the Bible… and how few have even read much of it.
A lot of people have very strong opinions about passages of scripture that they have not read. Let me encourage Christian people everywhere to go back and read Genesis 1-3 if you haven’t done so in a while before reading the rest of this article.
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There are two concepts that are vitally important to any biblical theory on the origins of mankind in specific and life in general. In my opinion, these are two of the most important concepts. They engage with “why” and “who.” It is vital to discover where someone stands on these two before intelligent discussion can follow.
Teleology – basically, this means “purpose.” Is there design to the universe? Is its form intentional? Is there any kind of “creator” behind it? Is the state of the universe the result of randomness in interaction with certain processes or is it the result of intentional order?
Providence – basically, this means continued interaction. Is there/has there been anything or anyone involved with the changes in the universe? Does this entity ever make changes in the universe; is it still involved or are the changes within the universe still the result of nothing more than randomness in interaction with certain processes?
Obviously, the Christian (along with about 94% of the rest of the world’s population) have come to the conclusion that there is teleology (purpose) to the universe. Many have also come to believe that there is a continued involvement of this “designer” throughout history.
Couldn’t there just be NO God/Designer/Creator, though?
I often say that I can identify with people who think there is NOTHING except the material world. As a psychologist, I can fathom that all of our concepts of God, gods, spirits, miracles, forces, minds, souls, etc. are essentially delusional. Certainly, humans are capable of that…
However, that also means that there is, as Nietzsche once said “No big dark secret behind it all…” or something like that… Meaning, there is NOTHING else.
My experience of seeming to have a mind, that is not merely my brain, is ILLUSION.
My emotions that I have when in love are NOTHING more than mating instincts.
The feelings of the miraculous I experience are NOTHING more than accidental delusion created by the way the human processor seeks to find patterns.
The camaraderie that I experience is not transcendent of merely my bio-chemical desire for a pack.
In other words, I would also need to accept that all of my experiences are NOTHING more than bio-chemical reactions in my body and MUST NOT be interpreted with any more meaning than that.
If there is no “supernatural,” then we are nothing more than slightly-to-somewhat more complex eating, pooping and mating machines with not more real significance (beyond complexity) than tape worms.
And with that uplifting thought, we will get ready for next week – so go back and read those passages again!
Click here for Part III
@Jordan Jones – I understand your adherence to the scientific method- take a look on Wikipedia at the definition of SM and find that it cannot be used to “prove” anything. It can however, be used to falsify.
Hiding from the truth? No, I have stepped into the light. The data to support an old-earth has one thing going for it – and only one thing – that the vast majority of scientists are unbelievers, and they reject God, so will support anything that speaks of an old earth regardless of its reliability.
But is it “science” that drives the age of something? No, it is the human mind, and only the human mind. Age is not a property of matter. Ages of something cannot be determined by examining the object alone, it has to be compared to something else of a known age, and the age is assigned through comparative analysis. There is nothing in human existence, including humans, that can determine the age of anything, including another human, without using something outside of the object as a means to determine age. Even a birth certificate, formulated by human minds, is not a part of the human it describes.
Way, way, way too much trust is placed in science and the scientific method to accurately determine things in deep-time that cannot be observed, measured or tracked over the many ages of time.
Here is a puzzle that nobody has solved: Diamonds are a carbon lattice. If carbon-14 could be found anywhere, it should be inside one. Except that diamonds, being the oldest rock in the world, should have no traces of it, becaue C14 would not last that long (it has a half-life of just over 5000 years). Every time C14 is found in a very-old-fossil, the secularists cry “seepage” or “adulteration” of the sample. This is impossble with a diamond, being the hardest natural substance. And yet when diamonds are crushed and examined, they contain high levels of C14. While it is true than Uranium can produce C14 in a diamond, the samples tested had no traces of Uranium in the diamond or the surrounding rocks. It is easy enough to guard against such things. So how did the C14 get there?
The fossils on the bottom of the sea beds are considered to be the primordial tomb of the world, but fossils pulled from there have high levels of carbon-14.
Whenever secularists want to refute a clear evidence for a young earth, they always appeal to a “rescue device”. That is, they will describe the perfect conditions for which the evidence is false withoout ever having to prove that the conditions actually existed.
Many years ago a scientist told me that in order for a population of sub-humans to “cross over” to become humans, the population would have to be producing a million individuals per year. This would mean ten million over ten years, 100 million over 100 years and 1 billion over 1000 years. All of this seems reasonable until we attempt to extrapolate back in time. Since 40,000 years ago, over one billion per thousand years appeared, meaning 40 billion sub-humans. And if 100,000 years, barely a blip on the evolutionary scale – 100 billion individuals. Here is a question: where is the evidence of their existence? that’s a lot of people – 100 billion folks and no evidence anywhere. of their culture or even their burial grounds. We should be hip-deep in bones if the evolutaionary narrative is correct.
What do we actually see? A cultural explosion in Mesopotamia around 3000 BC. Suddenly humans were producing arts, metallurgy, war weapons, furniture, fashion, makeup, and a wide range of other cultural aspects, all out of the blue. Are we to believe that these countless millions of sub-humans were just standing around, drooling and dragging their knuckles until – in one moment of time – the “cultural traffic light” changed and whoosh – culture abounded? And it abounded within a relarive walking distance of Ararat. And this is just a coincidence?
For the record, for many years I didn’t pay any attention to the age of the earth, and didn’t really think it mattered. I accepted that Genesis One plainly states that the earth was made in 6 days – and knew that God had mentioned this same 6 days in many other places in the Bible (e.g. the Ten Commandments) so took at face-value the claims of God. I didn’t however, “commit” to a young earth in terms of science. I knew enough about how science changes its mind every day and that there were plenty of examples of science getting things wrong, so I was content with this.
What convinced me that the earth is young, in scientific terms, was not the Bible, but the science. In short, I became a young-earth creationist based on the science, not on the Bible.
Most of the worlds leading creationist scientists started this way as well. They were evolutionary through-and-through – and were convinced of a young earth based on the science alone. We cannot say that the evidence isn’t there.
There are many others who have followed this same continuum, and many Christian people (I personally know) who have not reached this conclusion. They still hold to “long ages” in large part because they think it’s intellectually superior to do so. Or rather, they don’t want to be thought of as someone who believes based on the Word of God, but would rather believe based on the science (I get that!). Unfortunately, they were not very good at understanding scientific things and the only exposure they had was academic science, which is steeped in evolution and “long ages”.
More than once I have heard someone say “Well, our minds are fallen and we cannot hope to understand these things”.
But God has something else to say:
2Ti 1:7 “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. ”
He has given us a sound mind and has called us to reason with him. We should do exactly that.
Age is not a property of matter. It is an effect of time. Even if you Jordan have a birth certificate in-hand, you will need your mind to determine your age. The certificate is not a part of you, but was produced by minds who were present at your birth. If you were sitting across from me in a room you would not be able to determine my age without performing comparative analysis. This is the problem with dating things into deep-time – there is no baseline to compare it to – the people doing the dating believe that the processes in place today are running at the same rate as they have always been. But this isnt true, and it’s measurable.
The magnetic field of the Sun has now been linked to the magnetic field of the earth, and both are measurably decaying in strength. The magnetic field is what kkeeps cosmic bombardment at bay. It has been proven that cosmic bombardment increases nuclear decay. This simply means that as cosmic bombardment has increased as the magnetic field weakens, that nuclear clocks have been running increasingly faster, and today are running faster than they hav ever run.
If I have a clock on the wall that is running four times faster than the other clocks in the house, it will appear from this clock that four times as many days have transpired. Over time, if I use this clock to measure age, things will appear four times older. Accelerating clocks artificially age the earth.
Carbon–14 is made in the atmosphere and is absorbed by living things. When something dies, we measure it’s ratio of Carbon14 in the atmosphere to the amount in the dead animal. This ratio is the same for all creatures since it is based on the biomass in the earth today. We can see however, from the fossil record that the time before the flood the flora and fauna – the sheer biomass totally eclipsed the amount available today. If this is the case, then the total available Carbon-q4 would have been diluted compared to today’s standard. Any animal we measure from that time will appear to be older. In fact, one could measure it while still alive and it could apear to be tens of thousands of years old, if we measure it with today’s ratio.
The “evidence for an old earth” is selective.The scientistss ignore the evidence for a young earth, or rather they re-interpret the evidence to fit their worldview.
But no, you cannot go out into the world and find a fossil that is millions of years old. The age you will attribute to it is assigned by a human mind, and that human mind must apply comparative analysis against a baseline that doesn’t exist.
AnswersInGenesis does not promote a young earth solely becaue the Bible says so. There is abundant evidence that the earth is young, and abundant evidence that old-earth dating methods are radically flawed. Accepting either one requries more faith than science, because origins cannot be reproduced in a lab.
When Mary Schweitzer found DNA in T-rex bones, they thought it was an anomaly. But soft parts have been found in “fossils” for over a century and these are all well-documented. Even today more and more DNA samples are being found in dinosaur and other ancient “fossils”. The scientists who discover these things do not say “Whoa, we were waaaay-off about the age of that bone” – rather they say “Whoa, DNA really can last for millions of years!” Even though DNA has been rigorously tested to have a half-life of 523 years. They ar ewilling to make an exception, a leap of faith, because to do otherwise will refute their worldview. For those to believe the evolutonary narrative, they want to dismiss the notion that worldview is driving their conclusions, but all humans are biased – it’s just human nature.
Here is another good example of what I mean by there being others who are just as convinced about the evidence that the Earth is young. Again, I would love for Josh to add citations for some of the things that he claims in his responses, but I am glad that someone has responded from this perspective.
You talk about theology and science as both seeking “truth”. Yet within the context of the creation debate there are organisations like Answers in Genesis. They hold to a statement of faith that only things consistent with a literal reading of Genesis can be true; everything else must be false.
Do you believe such people are still trying to find what is true, or have they made up their mind?
Having made up one’s mind about something does not mean one is not seeking truth. I can look through a window and see a desk in a room – and make my mind up that it is there – but still open the door to see what else is in the room. I imagine they consider themselves deeply seeking truth. However, in many cases, they are quite/completely certain they have found it. The same can often be true of secularists. I don’t think this is not seeking the truth, it just many not be the truth. I don’t question their motives. I question their conclusions.
It seems to me that those who have already made up their minds, that the earth (and universe) is 6-10k years old, are actively hiding from the truth. The scientific evidence against such a belief is not only unquestionable, it is tangible. You can literally walk up with a fossil or rock and disprove that the world is only a few thousand years old. Denying what has been proven through scientific method is not a characteristic of someone seeking the truth, in my opinion.
To say that, in your opinion, that people with that view are clearly & obviously not correct is totally fine. That is what the discussion is all about. However, one of the errors of both sides of this debate is that because we think someone is wrong that they are not being honest about seeking the truth. Incidentally, it is always a key scientific tenet that statements cannot be “proven” through Empirical evidence… but I completely agree that Empirical Evidence IS a good source of knowledge. Keep seeking truth.