Every piece of scientific evidence, from disparate disciplines and reproducible observations, points to an earth and a universe that are billions of years old. Radiometric data from different isotopes. Geological data. Astrophysical data. Cosmological data. Spectroscopic data. Stellar evolution models. They are all in agreement that the cosmos is billions of years old.
The evidence for evolution is overwhelming. Millions of fossils, and yes, including transitional fossils. Evolution in the lab (see the amazing video below). Ring species showing how micro-evolution leads to macro evolution, if by the latter you mean two sets of organisms that cannot produce fertile offspring. Spectacular confirmed predictions such as the fused human chromosome #2 and the Tiktaalik, whose discovery (including which geological stratum and geographic location!) was predicted as described in the best selling book Your Inner Fish.
How will you, Christian, deal with this?
Will you admit that while the bible is the Word of God, your interpretation is quite fallible and work to reconcile scripture with irrefutable scientific evidence? Or will you argue that all the evidence for old age is through appearances only? Or perhaps you'll acknowledge that the scientific evidence is clear, but in spite of that you are going to believe that the universe is young, because that is what you think the bible teaches, with no wiggle room?
Or will you take the utterly dishonest Answers in Genesis (tax manipulator Ham) and/or the Institute for Creation Research (tax evader and ex-con Hovind) approach and argue that scientists constitute an atheistic conspiracy with the goal to undermine the bible and that science, if only done properly, actually supports a young cosmos. (It doesn't. That's a bald-faced lie.)
You've got to deal with it one of those ways.
I have a gut feeling that the YEC is weak because of their doctrine of God. We forget that God is atemporal, and man still becomes the measure of all things. I am waiting for the day when L will have the time and energy to use her scientific training and theology to challenge some of these creation views.
ReplyDeleteAre you sure L isn't already there?
DeleteShe's already there. Her professors just need to stop giving her so much homework. :) Or I will be her scribe and write down her insights, some of which I have already done.
DeleteI'm an "old-earther" but I see one teacher's point (it might have been John MacArthur.)
ReplyDeleteIf God created Adam and Even as fully functioning adults, without making them go through the infant/toddler/child...growing into adulthood phases...
why could He not do the same thing with creation, making it in its mature stage?
I'm not sure I have a great answer for that.
Hi MzEllen,
ReplyDeleteOf course God could do that.
This is my answer to that:
Let's allow that Adam and Eve were created as mature, functional adults. Most would not expect that God gave them false memories of childhood. However if the universe was created with just the appearance of age, it would seem that, unlike (we expect) Adam and Eve, God has given the universe false memories. For example God would have to have placed light in transit made to look like the light from supernova explosions from millions of years ago, explosions that that never actually happened.
Perfect. Thanks.
DeleteWhat are your thoughts on the origin of life then?
ReplyDeleteI don't really have any. It is, of course, a completely separate issue from evolution. Maybe something will come of this: https://origins.harvard.edu/
DeleteUltimately rocks, gas, and energy evolve into humans. That's the naturalist view (i.e. the mainstream one). You seem to have the naturalist point of view for the latter part of evolution so am I to assume that you extend this naturalism earlier as well?
ReplyDeleteI'm not trying to be argumentative but am genuinely curious how Christian physicists can reconcile these matters. Perhaps you've written on all this before but I didn't see much in my scrolling.
Nicholas,
ReplyDeleteI don't have the naturalist view of evolution. I affirm theistic evolution: In a nutshell, God used secondary means (evolution) to create the diversity of species, but the process was never outside of his sovereignty or control. To deny the overwhelming evidence of evolution would be, to me, to impugn God's character by casting him as a God of confusion and/or deceit. (If you equate that to the naturalist view then you should investigate how the true naturalists view us-- it is about as well as the Young Earth Creationists treat us). As for abiogenesis, the scientific progress has not been so great. If at some point I become convinced that scientists can describe the start of life via "natural" processes, then I'll declare myself a theistic abiogenesist. But at the moment (and probably in my lifetime) I won't have to take that step--I can just watch and wait.