Creation - YEC, 24x6x7, and other Theories

[Pastor Harold] No decayed animal matter before eating of the tree. No death till sin. How did we get 1,000,000 year old fossils?

My thoughts on the appearance of age were more about apparent cosmological age more than biological age. I think we would have to accept a mixture between the “appearance of age” and fallacious pattern recognition on the part of some scientists to get a total explanation for the evolutionary theory as it exists today.

From the poll thread on whether to add 6x24 to the site DS…

[Mike Durning] Ron, the appearance of age idea has really grabbed my attention lately. I know that some have dismissed it as making God a deceiver, but I think that’s oversimplifying.

To “deceive” your aim has to be communicate something, doesn’t it? What if in God’s thinking, it just looks right if He makes it all grown up in the first place? He is not responsible for our incorrect inferences.

But what does “age” really mean anyway in the instant of creation? If we posit that there was no universe before Genesis 1.1, there was also no space and no time.

I’m just monkeying around with the concepts involved here but what if “time” was rapidly accelerating until God decreed the end of the first day? In this scenario, there is no deception at all because along with creating the universe God created a history for it as well all in an instant. So there are billions of years but they all happened in a few nanoseconds.

Something to chew on. This is just off the top of my head, so don’t anybody take it too seriously.

[Jay C.] Split off from the SI Doctrinal Statement Thread:

[Pastor Harold] No decayed animal matter before eating of the tree. No death till sin. How did we get 1,000,000 year old fossils?

Some people have doubts about the veracity of dating methods used by scientists, their assumption of uniformity being but one.

[Aaron Blumer] But what does “age” really mean anyway in the instant of creation? If we posit that there was no universe before Genesis 1.1, there was also no space and no time. I’m just monkeying around with the concepts involved here but what if “time” was rapidly accelerating until God decreed the end of the first day? In this scenario, there is no deception at all because along with creating the universe God created a history for it as well all in an instant. So there are billions of years but they all happened in a few nanoseconds.

I confess to being an armchair physics junkie. Like all armchair experts, I may have only a cursory understanding of the data. So I invite correction, particularly if one of you has a more plush armchair or you are truly a professional cosmologist or physicist.

From a standpoint of modern cosmological theory, there is much debate about whether time existed prior to the big bang or if it started with the big bang. That means that modern physics theory leaves room for the idea that time came into being at the same time as the rest of our universe. Steven Hawking, for instance, has speculated both conditions in various writings.

A quick perusal of the literature and several scholarly forums on cosmology and physics revealed a few discussions on the concept of time distortions at the early moments after the big bang. The apparent width of the universe is 157 billion light years, but the presumed age of the universe (the presuming being done by some cosmologists, not Biblicists) is about 14 billion years. You see the problem in those numbers. If the universe were 14 billion years old, then the maximum width of the universe should be 28 billion light years (assuming the Big Bang had a center, which some dispute). The standard answer is that time-space itself is expanding, so that objects in space are NOT moving away from each other faster than the speed of light, though they appear to be relative to each other. But other theories, some involving time, have been proposed.

A most interesting theory arises from Professor Jose Senovilla and colleagues at the University of the Basque Country in Bilbao, Spain. He says that time may be slowing down since the big bang — literally leaching out of the universe. His theory is an attempt to dispose of the “Dark Energy” theory, a place-holder theory that tries to explain some galactic observations that are otherwise inexplicable. But according to his theory, billions of years for the universe is too long – time would have all leached away by then.

I know of no articles or theories that suggest the first “seconds” of the Big Bang accomplished “billions of years” worth of accomplishment, thus making Day 1 of Genesis compatible with Big Bang theory. The logical problem with creating such a theory is that those measurements “seconds” and “billions of years” are all from within our universe. There is no external frame of reference from which to measure the dilation of time in that way. But if you wish to suggest that 14 billion years of development happened in Genesis 1:1’s first day, why not? The assertion could not be proven or disproven by any means that I can think.

Any real physicists here?

We can start an Armchair Physicists Support Group.

Sean Carroll published a book back in January- http://www.amazon.com/Eternity-Here-Quest-Ultimate-Theory/dp/0525951334…] From Eternity to Here: The Quest for the Ultimate Theory of Time , He blogs at http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/ Cosmic Variance . He posits that time is not found in the underlying laws of physics, but is a unique aspect of our universe.

The arrow of time, therefore, is not a feature of the underlying laws of physics, at least as far as we know. Rather, like the up/down orientation space picked out by the Earth, the preferred direction of time is also a consequence of features of our environment. In the case of time, it’s not that we live in the spatial vicinity of an influential object, it’s that we live in the temporal vicinity of an influential event: the birth of the universe. The beginning of our observable universe, the hot dense state known as the Big Bang, had a very low entropy. The influence of that event orients us in time, just as the presence of the Earth orients us in space.

Which reminds me of Revelation 10:6 And sware by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer: Time does seem to be a unique feature of our universe. So God, who inhabits eternity (Isa 57:15) created time at the moment He spoke the universe into existence… I mean, He managed to create day and night without having the sun and moon in place, which is the primary method of how we measure time… and it seems that God is also going to remove time as a feature when He is finished with this universe.

But six 24 hour days is a pattern throughout Scripture, and to my knowledge, every time the word ‘day’ is used in reference to creation it is the word for a ‘sunrise/sunset’ kind of day. I think I’m saying that God may not have experienced 6/24 days, but our universe did.

[Susan R] But six 24 hour days is a pattern throughout Scripture, and to my knowledge, every time the word ‘day’ is used in reference to creation it is the word for a ‘sunrise/sunset’ kind of day. I think I’m saying that God may not have experienced 6/24 days, but our universe did.

Agreed. I was responding to Aaron’s thoughts.

Thanks for the references. I’ll look them up.

Adam was created with a history. He was a fully grown man of around thirty years of age ( with a belly button). A tree was created with a history because it was fruit bearing. The whole of creation was put in place with a history. History demands age and age demands the effects of decay. So the effects were in place before the decay entered in via sin.

When the first sign at Cana was given the wine had a history. The creator Himself had bypassed the very means He had put in place. Rain becomes wine through a long process. Messiah just said the word and the water (rain) was wine….or thought the thought?

Huw, perhaps you meant to post that one here…

http://sharperiron.org/forum/poll-jesus-turned-water-john-2

I meant to post it here.

I would appreciate it if you left my post where it should be and delete the other.

[Huw] So the effects were in place before the decay entered in via sin.

I’m a bit skeptical of this statement. Can you support it from a Biblical passage? I can think of several that would seem to proclude it.

[Huw] I meant to post it here.

I would appreciate it if you left my post where it should be and delete the other.

This thread is about views of the creation week. Perhaps you can elaborate further to help me see the relevance?

Susan, interesting ideas there about time. Just read a novel that has my wheels turning about time. When it comes right down to it, we do not really know what it is.

In the novel, there’s a moment where one character muses that maybe everything that happens is really always happening (or perhaps even static) and “time” is just our consciousness moving through events.

An interesting notion to chew on (this is why I like Sci Fi).

As far as the creation week goes, there’s really no reason why the “days” couldn’t have been full days that happened in a fraction of a second from our point of view… had we been there to have a point of view. Except that going that route puts the whole grammatical historical paradigm in the blender. It seems perilous to make a “day” with an “evening” and “morning” mean something so different from a “day” in so many other contexts.

(But we do know there are a few other exceptions warranted by context—e.g., “the day of the Lord”).

Mike, I’m curious, do you believe there was death before the Fall?

Mr Durning,

As far as science is concerned there is a process that is needed to produce coal and that takes millions of years. Yet we find that Tu’bal-cain was an artificer in brass and iron. This process needs coal, as the heat given off wood does not reach the required temperature. I’d use this as Biblical proof of the effects of decay being in place before sin entered in.

Thanks for the question. I had not considered this until you asked.

[Huw] Mr Durning,

As far as science is concerned there is a process that is needed to produce coal and that takes millions of years. Yet we find that Tu’bal-cain was an artificer in brass and iron. This process needs coal, as the heat given off wood does not reach the required temperature. I’d use this as Biblical proof of the effects of decay being in place before sin entered in.

Thanks for the question. I had not considered this until you asked.

Why not allow for the possibility that at least some of the coal in the earth was a product of direct creation?

My concern is that certain Biblical texts (like Rom. 5:12 and Rom. 8:20-22 in context) have been understood to indicate that death and corruption came about because of the fall of man.

I’m saying all the coal was a product of direct creation, because within YEC there has not been time for the coal to form and certainly not the oil, which I’m told is the future product of coal. After a few million years (sic)

Within the seasons of a year we have the autumn or fall as you people call it. The autumn is the season of dying back. Was this season in place before or after the fall? Scripture says before the fall and that is according to 1:14-15 of Genesis.

Looking at Rmns 5:12 I see the the effect of sin upon humanity, In Rmns 8:20-22 I read that the creature was subjugated to vanity and we are aware of why. The fall was not something that just happened and to think that it was a surprise to the Eternal Almighty and that no preparation had been made is not in line with scriptures.

We know the plan of salvation and the election was made prior to creation so is a a giant leap to think that the effects of sin were not only known, but arranged to be acted out?

Thanks for your input Mr D. It’s given me much to think about.

Just a thought. We know that a protected garden was put in place for Adam. What was going on outside the garden?

I think there was a topic on the old site about decay that was pretty good. I will try and find it, but perhaps someone else can look as well. Essentially, the consensus (go team ‘small group’…) was that decay is a natural process and was a part of creation and before the fall. If I remember right, it was also said that decay does not equal death. In other words, if decay != death then decay could have been before the fall.

The other consideration we must have is that sin existed before the fall.

”sin entered into the world”.

Daniel, I’d be interested in reading that archived thread as well.

I’ve often heard that there was no predation before the Fall… and some passages certainly suggest that. And we tend to lump decay in with the effects of the curse.

Seems like decay involves a couple of things

1) Simply one substance becoming another over time as various factors act on it (bacteria eating it, UV breaking it down, the effects of seasonal temp changes, weather related and other kinds of erosion, on it goes)

2) Entropy

Perhaps before the Fall, we have non-predatory forms of decay (ie, bacteria are not eating and “killing” living things?). But what about entropy? I’m not sure I understand it well enough to speak to that, but it seems to involve a gradual falling apart of things. Hard to see this as being part of a “good” creation… but also hard to envision any kind of “decay” where you don’t have entropy.

I don’t know… more I think about it, more trouble I have seeing any decay before the Fall. If we don’t have bacteria preying on living things and they don’t have anything “dead” to consume, doesn’t seem like you can have biological decay. And if you don’t have entropy, how can you have non-organic/geological/etc. decay?

Seems simpler to suppose that there was no decay.

Edit: but how can you have digestion without decay? I guess this is what the creationist journals and magazines are for. It’s way out of my competency zone.

[Aaron Blumer] But what about entropy? I’m not sure I understand it well enough to speak to that, but it seems to involve a gradual falling apart of things. Hard to see this as being part of a “good” creation… but also hard to envision any kind of “decay” where you don’t have entropy.

Without going into detail, the entire physics of our creation would have had to have been different if entropy did not function at all before the fall. EVERYTHING would have changed with the curse. I’m not even sure we can comprehend how the universe worked if there was no entropy.

I’m not sure that all entropy has to be missing pre-fall, though. Perhaps some of the physics aspects of entropy could still exist prior to the fall and curse. Energy consumption (changing states) is considered by modern physics to be part of entropy. I’m not sure how the universe would work without that, at least. Starts would not burn, for instance. But I can’t think of any Biblical reason that it would be ruled out before the fall and curse.