Rejecting Six Literal Days - What's the Real Motivation?

[Mark_Smith]

I am in a position to be able to ask questions of a YEC model. I have a PhD in physics and cosmology. I know the physical evidence. I know the Scriptures as well.

And here is the truth. I really don’t try to operate as an apologist for YEC.

You know why? Anything I say about it I get twice as much fire against me from YEC Christians as anyone else. The vast majority of YEC Christians (if not all) are of the variety of “God said it, that settles it”. They don’t want to know any physical evidence. They don’t want to ask any questions. They are happy, cheerful, and proud to be ignorant of science, especially cosmology and astronomy.

It is sad.

Trust, me I am very aware of the physical evidence. In many ways, we can’t even make calculations without the assumptions of an older universe. And in reality the age we think of it now, may very well change to be even greater in the future as there are assumptions made to the Hubble Constant, that may change as observations change. I wish I had an awesome answer to resolve the two, but I don’t. All I know is that the miraculous effects of creation had a massive, profound effect on the universe and our observations are limited. It could be that both of those are the reason for the difference, or it could be something entirely. Maybe the difference is there to force faith. A lot of people say that if God just made it clear it would be accepted by man. But when God himself walked amongst man and revealed himself, they still rejected him as being crazy. So I don’t know.

[Larry Nelson]

dgszweda wrote:

A recent Gallup poll found that only 33% of scientists believe in God, and that number is falling. The more educated you are in a scientific field the less you believe in a God. Even less believe in Creation.

I’m not arguing anything here; I’m wondering: Would this be because, say, earning a Ph.D in a scientific field leads or corresponds to a loss of faith; or is it because Christians, for whatever reason(s), are less inclined or likely to earn advanced scientific degrees?

It could be the wisdom we seek after in knowledge actually clouds are ability to seek God as shown in Romans 1:18-23. I know many Christians who seek advanced degrees, I just think that in general worldly knowledge has the tendency to blind people to the faith in God. Paul talks about this when he addresses the Greeks and their great teachers as well.

[Mark_Smith]

Example- The Sun is extremely dense material. So dense that light must take 170,000+ years to move from the core to the surface. Yet, if the universe is young, that is not enough time. So, even our daily sunlight is an OVERT miracle. We should not be able to see anything from the Sun. Also, the energy the Sun produces today in its core will NEVER be observed assuming you believe the universe will end sometime before 170,000 years. YEC is ASTOUNDING in its conclusions. Thus, I say it makes science like astronomy pointless.

Mark,

Don’t you see that the conclusions you point to are the direct result of the philosophical assumptions you bring to the table? And I don’t mean just you, but every scientist who studies the natural world is bound by his presuppositions. The idea that we should have to wait 170,000+ years to see sunlight is a great example. This conclusion only makes sense if we assume uniformitarianism rather than special creation, because Genesis 1 would have us believe that God created the sun in such a way that it produced visible light immediately. How did he do that? I don’t know, since he doesn’t say, but it certainly could be a relativistic solution.

Does that mean that astronomy is pointless? Well, that might be going a bit too far, but it sure sounds like you are searching for an epistemological certainty that is simply impossible in any scientific discipline. I agree with you that the natural laws are uniform in their application as far as we can tell, but I don’t really think that is very far at all. And I, for one, would not be too troubled if it were discovered that it doesn’t in fact take light 170,000+ years to get from the sun’s core to its surface, or that NGC 1512 isn’t actually 30 million light years away from earth.

Frankly, it doesn’t have to be all or nothing when it comes to science. We do not have to embrace uniformitarianism without criticism, nor do we have to reject it without qualification. Much of what we know about the natural world is based on the assumption that the universe actually follows uniform laws, but we come to that knowledge with humility because we recognize that it is based on our flawed human understanding. On the other hand, we know with absolute certainty that God has indeed set aside those natural laws at times in the past, so we ought to be even more cautious about assuming that the natural laws we have observed apply in every situation and at all times.

Paul

[Mark_Smith]

What does facebook have to do with measurements of the age of the moon, or the earth, or the distance to the Milky Way galaxy, or the age of the universe? Surely you aren’t so critical that the admittedly human scientific endeavor is as banal as facebook entries?

The facebook example was not meant to be taken literalistically. :) The comment was referencing the trend whereby we are more controlled by the fear of man than the fear of God. My oberservation is that most Christians who reject the plain teachings in Genesis 1 and 2 are more affected by the opinions of people (be that in the facebook world or in real life), than they are by God’s Word.

[Bob Hayton]

Ron Bean wrote:

Has anyone mentioned the possibility that God created everything with the appearance of age? After all the wine at Cana was created with the appearance and qualities of age.

This argument doesn’t work for the immense ages in question. Even Ken Ham doesn’t use this or prefers not to.

I don’t understand why the size of ages nullifies the argument. Could someone explain? Does that mean that God could create things with the appearance of a little age but not immense age?

I am not a scientist or a theologian. I admit it and will just wait to see who uses it against me. :)

That being said, one thing that seems clear here is that both sides don’t like the “created to look old” idea. As just a normal person, throwing out that theory presents a big problem when I look at something like this: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evidence_against_a_recent_creation

Here is my perspective on this. I see Ham try to attack carbon 14 dating because of a few obscure mistake it made and what it appears like is something akin to trying to put out a forest fire with a teacup when you consider that there are 30+ other methods of dating that conflict with YEC.

No, it is not as plain as 2+2=4 but you have to admit that the level of faith required to accept YEC in light of that is pretty high and the more you know, the higher the faith required. That is why I highly respect Mark who still apparently hold to YEC in spite of what he knows. I just don’t get why he gets attacked here so much by the YEC crowd just because he is willing to acknowledge the important and significant challenges that YEC faces. This conversation has been pretty respectful but it is usually not that way.

[Ron Bean]

Bob Hayton wrote:

Ron Bean wrote:

Has anyone mentioned the possibility that God created everything with the appearance of age? After all the wine at Cana was created with the appearance and qualities of age.

This argument doesn’t work for the immense ages in question. Even Ken Ham doesn’t use this or prefers not to.

I don’t understand why the size of ages nullifies the argument. Could someone explain? Does that mean that God could create things with the appearance of a little age but not immense age?

Here is an answer from Dr. Tommy Mitchell posted at Answers in Genesis:

God is not a deceiver. He cannot lie. Numbers 23:19 states, “God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?” So why would God try and deceive us by creating things with the appearance of “age.” Why would He make the universe look “old” when it is not?

Now the rest of the article says creation is mature, and no one knows what a young earth would look like so it is invalid to call earth old. But I think that is largely a dodge. We know what tree rings and ice cores are for smaller time frames and can extrapolate that out to longer ages.

But to answer your question, this is why. If the earth is meant to look old (and the universe, for that matter), but it isn’t really old, than it would be as if God was deceiving us — which of course, He isn’t. And to go back to my earlier point, since nature speaks, and God invites us to listen and use our senses to learn of Him, then this point about appearance of great age when in fact it is very young, would more clearly be deception. Hence I believe in an old earth.

Is it possible to hold to both an old earth and a literal six day creation?

[Ron Bean]

Is it possible to hold to both an old earth and a literal six day creation?

In some sense it might be possible to a degree. First, I don’t believe the Bible teaches a gap or long days in the Creation account. Second, I don’t think the Bible explicitly states that the earth is 6,000 years old. This number first came about when Ussher tied together the genealogies in Scripture. I don’t think we can take the genealogies and just assume that this is a scientific description of the age of the universe. Genealogies are not meant to be absolute and 100% complete. We know this because gaps exist in some areas and overlaps occur in others. We also don’t know with certainty how long Adam was in the garden. Was his genealogical age taken when he was created or when he left the garden. I just don’t think we can be 100% dogmatic here. With that said, I don’t see spaces where we see billions of years or a great sense of age that had elapsed.

Thus my assertion that by accepting YEC you lose the ability to do science in the universe. You can study light on earth, you can study thermodynamics on earth, you can study nuclear chemistry on earth…etc. BUT THE SECOND you go back more than 6000 years on earth (say in evolution or geology), or you look at things out in the cosmos, you have to shrug your shoulders and scream “MIRACLE, I have no idea what happened other than a miracle”. YEC comes with the cost of lack of knowledge about the cosmos.

Ron,

We can believe in a literal creation - God had a special, miraculous role in creating the earth, the universe, and dividing water from water, water from land, assigning roles for the planets and sun, and creating the various life forms.

We can also believe the six days are a poetic, metaphorical description of God’s creation. Even ancient readers would scratch their head at the sun being created on day 4. Obviously, this could possibly not be a straightforward account but an arrangement in a poetical, parallel fashion (and Jews love parallelism). The term for day in Gen. 2 does not mean 24 hour period. A numeral and a day in Hosea does not mean 24 hour periods. The definite article is not used with yom in this text. These arguments allow for a longer time to be mentioned by the text. Gen. 1:1-2 on the face of it, do not appear to be part of the six days, since day 1 starts in vs. 3.

This is how numerous old earth creationists, many of whom have high regard for intelligent design and disagree completely with evolution, can hold to a literal creation and Gen. 1 being a literary account of God’s literal/actual/real creative work. Yet they also hold to an old earth.

For more, see: http://godandscience.org/youngearth/old_earth_creationism.html

[GregH]

I am not a scientist or a theologian. I admit it and will just wait to see who uses it against me.

That being said, one thing that seems clear here is that both sides don’t like the “created to look old” idea. As just a normal person, throwing out that theory presents a big problem when I look at something like this: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evidence_against_a_recent_creation

Here is my perspective on this. I see Ham try to attack carbon 14 dating because of a few obscure mistake it made and what it appears like is something akin to trying to put out a forest fire with a teacup when you consider that there are 30+ other methods of dating that conflict with YEC.

No, it is not as plain as 2+2=4 but you have to admit that the level of faith required to accept YEC in light of that is pretty high and the more you know, the higher the faith required. That is why I highly respect Mark who still apparently hold to YEC in spite of what he knows. I just don’t get why he gets attacked here so much by the YEC crowd just because he is willing to acknowledge the important and significant challenges that YEC faces. This conversation has been pretty respectful but it is usually not that way.

Greg, I agree that trying to use a YEC view to discredit science creates more problems than it solves. First, most of the science used to discredit evolution, big bang… is oftentimes poor science. The scientific community is not stupid. They may be misguided, but they aren’t just throwing out bad science after bad science. There is a lot of secular scientists who make a name for themselves discrediting poor work. Peer reviewed journals tend to weed out a lot of bad science as well. Second, the field of science is constantly changing, so what is once thrown out as a good rebuttal to science, invariable is no longer valid, because everything has changed. I read somewhere that a group of scientists reviewed the Scopes Trial and found that all of the evidence used, both by secular as well as the Christian scientists, were no longer valid with today’s theories.

One book that has helped me with some of my though process, was a book titled, “The Limitations of Scientific Truth”. It was written by Nigel Bush, who is a pretty well credentialed scientist with about 5 degrees, so not just a Bible graduate. You can find his book on Amazon.

From a scientific perspective it appears to be a great leap. But there is a huge and growing sense in this world that at the end of the day true knowledge comes from science and engineering. These fields will solve the problems of the world. This is something I felt was first laid out well in the novel “Atlas Shrugged” back in 1957. I have found the concept increasingly pervading the church. There continues to be a growing need to resolve the Bible with science. I say it in this way, because looking clearly with just a Biblically lens the average person would come to agree that the Bible teaches a young earth created in 6 literal days. It isn’t until we bring in science, and this continuing movement that science has it right that we begin to struggle with the creation account. Since science is an ever evolving collection of knowledge that is changing, we view science as just getting better and closer to the truth.

[Mark_Smith]

Thus my assertion that by accepting YEC you lose the ability to do science in the universe. You can study light on earth, you can study thermodynamics on earth, you can study nuclear chemistry on earth…etc. BUT THE SECOND you go back more than 6000 years on earth (say in evolution or geology), or you look at things out in the cosmos, you have to shrug your shoulders and scream “MIRACLE, I have no idea what happened other than a miracle”. YEC comes with the cost of lack of knowledge about the cosmos.

Why can’t we as YEC just say that the universe appears with this age and for all intents and purposes of studying science we will make the assumption of this age. I had no problem studying pulsars at Arecibo Observatory, even though the age of these exceeded what I believe the universe would be. I believe someone can separate their scientific study with their religious beliefs.

There are a number of creationists who practice Astronomy and Astrophyics. Dr Danny Faulkner is one and is the Professor Emeritus teaching astronomy and physics at the University of South Carolina. He aligns with my views and has published many articles in peer reviewed scientific journals, including stars that are more than 6,000 light years away.

Was Noah’s flood worldwide?

[Bob Hayton]

Andy,

I actually was trying to type on a mobile device and it was easier to copy a line I had used on another site, in the thread at DTBS’s blog on this question. The topic of special and natural revelation came up there.

Nature, and observations of nature, mean something. And just because man accepts a “fact” from nature doesn’t mean we should immediately be suspicious of gravity, electrical current or etc. Not to say observations from nature are inerrant either. But they can help us in evaluating our interpretation of Scripture in the sense that God is author both of nature and of Scripture and what we know of God’s character leads us to assume we would not find direct contradictions between the book of nature, and the book of Scripture.

I haven’t read all the comments here and maybe this has come up but there is a huge question of the observeability of all this. Bringing up tree rings or ice layers in the arctic to prove a certain age of anything related to the earth assumes God couldn’t have created the tree rings or ice layers by speaking them into being. Aside from Ken Ham’s frequent, shall we say: overstating his case, he does make a good point about the nature of science. It can only infer back to an age of something outside of recorded history (and really inside too). For example a star is 36 million light years away. Do I have to assume that the star is that many years old? I do if I live in a naturalistic universe with no outside God able to create all the light rays between me and that star. But I don’t live in such a world. I live in a world where God Himself is so powerful that he can appear to make anything as old as he wants and science can’t make statements to the contrary with any certainty other than that, assuming there is no such God, this and such is likely true based on what we know now about the nature of the universe.