Christians: Does age of earth matter?

[/QB]</font>[/QUOTE]Richard Dawkings clearly sees the futility of marrying evolution with God's Word. Many Bible believing (literal Bible believing) Christians see that point as well.

And what of our evolutionist brethren? Why they faithfully see in that "nothing left to explain" statement of Dawkings above - the perfect size box "for their god" to do all that evolutionism needs him to do so the system works.

In Christ,

Bob

 

I love how Paul of Eugene and UTEOTW just ignore the above question... I guess the implications are unsettling and so they just ignore the data and move on... As do most "Christian" evolutionists.

 

"Genetics is a good example of the failings of evolutionism's doctrines its predictions and the degree to which it can appeal to the objective mind.

Evolutionism "needs" multiple starts for ANY new class rather than one shot-in-the-dark "hopeful monster" that fails to find a mate."

I am not sure what you are talking about here. Just how has genetics failed evolution?

I do not know what you mean by "multiple starts for ANY new class" but I do nknow that no one believes that hopeful monsters are how most new traits are introduced.
On the contrary, they are built up slowly. That is one interesting thing that study of genetics and proteins tells us. Often, new traits are built up by slightly modifying existing genes in new ways. We have even seen the mutations that allow this to happen. A functional gene is duplicated. One copy is sufficient to maintain the function while one is free to mutate into something new and useful. When looking at genetics, we find so often that proteins used for widely varing functions are very closely related to one another.

"But mtDNA shows that males go back to "one" parent and females all go back to "one and only one" parent. This is the "classic prediction" of the Creator's view given to us in Genesis 1 and summarized for us in Exodus 20."

Well, close. mtDNA is only inherited from your mother, but there are other ways to trace the genetic path back to one man, also. But simple math shows that this outcome is predicted for any breeding population.

You brought up mtDNA so we will focus on that. It passes down only through the females. So let's look at all the females of a given generation. Now each person can only have one mother so the population of mothers in one generation cannot be larger than the population of daughters in the next. The numbers can only be the same if each woman only has one daughter. If any one has more than one daughter, then the number of mothers will be smaller than the number of daughters. So, if you start of with a given population of females, then number of females that gave rise to them MUST be smaller. If you keep the process up, you have no choice but to be able to trace back to a single female who is the ancestor of all females of a given population. The same thing can be done with males. It is a curiousity of math. Now this does not mean that the man or woman to whom we can be traced back was the only man or woman alive at the time. If you were to do the test at different points in time, you would even expect to get different answers. But both views will predict that you trace back to a single individual when doing the ancestor checks you describe. It is inevitable.

 

"The proposal from our evolutionist brethren is that we refute, deny and reject the Word of God every time it mentions any fact that would be beyond the science of the people God is speaking to."

1. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
2. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
3. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
4. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
5. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
6. That would leave clear evidence we could test for.
7. That would leave clear evidence we could test for.
8. That would leave clear evidence we could test for.
9. That could not be tested for. We accept that on faith.
10. That might or might not leave things to test for. Archeology would be your best hope if you want to check on it. But lack of data does not necessarily throw it out.
11. That would leave clear evidence we could test for.

We do not deny that God can use miracles. He wouldn't be God if He could not. But a recent Creation implies certain predictions that we can look about and check.

 

"I love how Paul of Eugene and UTEOTW just ignore the above question."

Not saying that anything is beyond the capability of God. Just that the evidence from God's own Creation is that it is quite ancient. The only logical conclusion is that God was trying to teach us something other than a blow by blow accounting of His creation in Genesis. This has no bearing on what He may choose to do in the future.

 

BobRyan,

Evolution is science. Please look at the following website: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolphil/falsify.html

Moreover, as we have previously discussed, both the theory of created kinds and the theory of evolution make predictions about the genomes of organisms which the theory of evolution would say are closely related. I claim that the prediction of what one would find in genomes of organisms we think are related makes evolution falsifiable on the basis of molecular biology. It is not clear to me that Karl Popper considered this. Did you know that the DNA of chimpanzees and humans is 99% identical? That's interesting, isn't it? Because it's not what would be predicted from creation of each created kind from scratch without repeating what has gone before.

BobRyan, did you read the mtDNA article I referenced? Please pay particular attention to the number of years ago the common ancestor existed according to the mtDNA analysis. I submit to you that this is inconsistent with a YEC perspective. But yes...it does get you to Adam and Eve. So you see there are truths in the Genesis account. Perhaps as much truth as men of Moses' time were prepared to accept.

Why is a statement such as "the theory of evolution is not entirely without empirical support" a lame epitaph in your estimation? Because it doesn't go along with your world view?

cotton,

It doesn't bother me that you take every word of the Bible literally. There are a lot worse things than that. And I fail to see that it can do you or your family any harm. That of course doesn't mean that you are completely correct.

Ask Mr. Dawkins how the first living cell came to be and how it came to be that this cell had adequate nutrients on which to feed. I would love to hear his explanation. And I would evaluate this explanation when determining whether God "made it look as if he didn't exist."

How would I translate Genesis? Good question. And I defer to anyone with a theology background who can do this better than I.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless, empty, and darkness covered all that was. (I wish I had a Jewish Torah with me...Christian translators have taken a few liberties with Genesis already.)

And over the eons, in time so deep that man can hardly comprehend it, God first by the power of his Word created light. The creation of light changed the universe, for in creating light, God created the matter that produces light in the universe. On the earth, called the period of plentiful light from earth's nearest star &lt;Hebrew for day&gt; and the period of its visible absence &lt;Hebrew for night&gt;.

Still in deep time, time which can be experienced as a day only by God, God also caused the earth to give rise to the atmosphere which we percieve as the sky. God called this expanse &lt;insert Hebrew for sky&gt;.

Still in deep time, time which can be experienced as a day only by God, by the power of His Word, God created dry land as an expanse between the waters such that the land separated water from water. The land was all one body, and man calls that body "Pangaea" today. The waters were gathered into one single ocean, unseparated by continents. God called the dry ground &lt;Hebrew for land&gt;. The waters God called &lt;Hebrew for seas&gt;. And God saw that what He had made was Good. God then, by the power of His Word, caused the land to produce vegetation of all sorts, each kind giving rise to progeny which for the most part resemble the parent plant. And God saw that what he had created was Good. [Now bear in mind that God also created many small organisms which the folks of Moses' time did not know about, and their creation was not told in Genesis. &lt;footnote about how creation of a cell violates known laws of science&gt;]

And God by the power of His Word, in deep time that can be understood as a day only by God and perhaps his angels, caused lights to separate day from nights and to park seasons, days, and years. God made the earth to rotate in a roughly 24-hour period. God caused the earth's gravity to capture the moon. God made sure that the stars could be seen through earth's atmosphere by those he yet planned to create. And God saw goodness is that which He had made.

Still in deep time, which can be perceived as a day only by one who is immortal, God by the power of His Word, caused the waters to teem with living creatures. God created all living things. And God made each living thing produce progeny generally like its parent, though with some possible difference. God made life in the seas, on the land, in the sky, and even in places where we cannot easily perceive life.

More recently, though still quite long ago as men perceive time, God created mankind in order to have a personal relationship with mankind. Mankind was made nearer to God as an organism than any organism that had been made before, and God gave mankind rulership over the rest of created life on planet earth. God required that mankind be fruitful and multiply, increasing in number to fill the earth and subdue it. &lt;footnote demonstrating how mankind is now the dominant species in all habitable land masses in accordance with God's design&gt;

(None of the above is to be taken as a new Bible version or as anything but one possible interpretation of Genesis. Nothing removed is to be construed as removed from the Word, and nothing added is to be construed as added to the Word other than as interpretation.)

Cotton, I almost didn't do the translation part because I have a suspicion that you asked it of me in order to find fault with what I produced. Even after writing it, I seriously considered deleting it. However, if fault there be, let it be pointed out to me. I also am not convinced that Paul or UTEOTW couln't do a better job of translation than I have done.

 

CG you wrote:

"It doesn't bother me that you take every word of the Bible literally. There are a lot worse things than that."

Well thanks. I think.

And to continue:

"And I fail to see that it can do you or your family any harm. That of course doesn't mean that you are completely correct."

Man, this is not about being 'completely correct'; this topic is "Does it matter and what are the consequences (paraphrased of course)"! See, I haven't posted (at least in my memory) on the age of the earth topic. That debate is pointless for me because it takes an incredible amount of study that I could be using to study God's Word. And it appears to me (and from my own 'conversion' that nothing can prove creation to an evolutionist EXCEPT God's Word.

Your translation is your interpretation; I just wanted to see where you stood. It appears to me to stand in contradiction to a literal translation. If indeed, God created things from your point of view, he could just as easily recorded it that way back then.

As far as the Torah is concerned I study from a Stone Edition Tanakh and The Complete Jewish Bible. Both recount the creation in English very close to the Christian account. I have also translated the first few verses of Genesis from the Hebrew (back when I had time, I can't speak Hebrew so it was painstaking). I don't know how you can translate it any other way than has been done. I'm sure alot of Christians wish it could be translated differently. I think you do a disservice to Christian translators (when you say that they change things), as I don't believe they have taken any liberties with the creation account.

Perhaps we should discuss what 'literally' means. But I doubt that would get us to common ground.
Thanks,
Cotton

 

cotton,

I only wrote those things because you indicated that your father was very disturbed that you took every word of the Bible literally. And you also mentioned that "non-believers," who I hope you mean to include only those who do not believe in Jesus, not non-literal interpreters of Genesis were infuriated at your approach.

I actually don't think it matters much whether you accept my interpretation of Genesis or yours. I don't think atheism follows from OE evolution.

I think you are probably right that we wouldn't achieve common ground on the meaning of Genesis 1-2. You are right that my interpretation contradicts a literal translation. I can't with a straight face deny that.

I have to agree with you that God could have recorded it that way back then. And one explanation I would provide would sacrifice what I usually regard as inerrancy of Scripture by action of the Holy Spirit. The other is that God explained it as best the folks at that time could understand it. God emphasized God's own role in the process by which all life was made. I'm not entirely sure that God didn't tell folks back then what He had done and it didn't get changed through oral history. (It isn't clear to me that Adam could write, not is it clear that the entire account was repeated for Moses except by broad reference to that with which Moses was familiar.)

What doctrinal errors other than a different view of how things came to be necessarily flow from OE evolution as opposed to YEC? I fail to see how the promises of Revelation are invalidated. Perhaps those who think they would be can explain why they think so.

 

Well, BobRyan, as for these two statements I agree with them! But before you drop your eye teeth let me explain what I mean:

a) "no absolute proof" - - absolute proof is for whiskey and/or mathematics. We do have compelling evidence that it is fairly perverse to deny.

b) "Would be abandoned tomorrow" . . . well, maybe it would take a a whole week &lt;ggg&gt; but the point is that, in theory, evolution is falsifiable, if compelling evidence against it can be marshalled. What that compelling evidence might be is fairly simple to set forth. It isn't on the table yet.

c) Scientists, unlike layment, make a distinction between theory and fact. The idea of common descent of all life from original one celled form is more strongly held than the modern synthetic theory of how that one celled life was able to produce the variety of life we see today. (Both are strongly held, of course).

I would like to be able to read the original article with these distinctions kept in mind to see how much they are found there but alas I do not have access to that journal . . .

 

Sorry Bob, I wasn't ignoring you, I just missed your response.

I don't know exactly what conditions existed before Adam but the Bible has no problem with the natural order of the food chain and neither do I.

Take for example Job 39 where God is pictured as presiding over His creation in wisdom and in full control of the predator/prey relationship:

Pretty graphic is it not? Yet one would think that if animal death was such a horrible thing God would be depicted as incorporating it with the sin of man. Such is not the case. The food chain as described here is seen as under God's command and wisdom, not as a result of man's sin.

The point of this passage is that the Christian life is one of patience and hope. The state in which creation exists presently is not it's final one. God has a perfect plan for all of creation which has not yet been realised. The parallel is that we are to consider the suffering of this world not worthy compared to that which God has ultimately planned for us.

I'm sorry but there is no mention of sin here or of the curse of death being placed upon the animal kingdom in connection with Adam's sin.

Just exactly how is nature in bondage to slavery and corruption? Let's review God's judgement against Adam after the fall.

Here we have the ground springing forth thistles, we have man forced into a life of labor and toil cultivating the land. Our natural role as stewards has been altered dramatically. Where is the animal death? I don't see it proclaimed here or anywhere else in Scripture, will you please show it to me? I see creation subject to futility, but no animal death being introduced as a new phenomenon.

I believe God created mankind in love as free from these things, but man through his disobediance was cursed by them.

No, it does not.

This statement I agree with.



I said: Your focus on physical death is but a triviality. It's meaningless.


To which you replied:

And yet Paul said :

18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
Your argument is with Paul.

I don't know why you would reference this passage to support your claim when in fact it does the exact opposite. We eagerly await the fulfillment of God's plan for us. The present suffering is not worthy in comparison.

Paul starts Romans 8 by making the distinction between the fleshly carnal mind which is death, and the spiritual mind which is life. Again, I assert, all humans will one day be resurrected for judgement, all people will exist in one form or another for the rest of eternity, some who have recieved their full final adoption as sons of God, and some to eternal damnation, so you tell me, what kind of life is the Bible primarily concerned with, spiritual or physical?

 

I love how Paul of Eugene and UTEOTW just ignore the above question... I guess the implications are unsettling and so they just ignore the data and move on... As do most "Christian" evolutionists. </font>[/QUOTE]The last chapters of Revelation I consider to be my hope and I consider them to be a promise from God.

But I don't take everything in there literally.

For example, the Holy City that descends from heaven is described as being very, very large. No problem there for me, but if we consider it to be a cube - and if we put a sphere the size of the moon superimposed on that cube - the corners of the cube will stick out above the surface of the sphere. Like giant mountains on the moon!

That's a pretty big city!

So then John said he was taken to a high mountain to watch that city come down from heaven to earth.

Mountains of earthly material, at any rate, can only go so high before squashing down of their own weight. The moon itself, you know, although made of solid rock, squashed itself into a spherical shape just under its own gravity.

So forgive me if I take this bit about being in a high mountain to see this take place to be non-literal.

I'm going to post a study outline of Revelation on my web site one of these days - maybe you'll look it over just for a good laugh

 

According to Evolution - can God make a city and have it come down from space?

According to Evolution - can God raise the Dead? Did He in fact raise the dead?

According to Evolution - did He create the World in 6 days as He said and then command us to also work for that same length of time and rest the seventh?

According to Richard Dawkings - evolution leaves "nothing for God to do" - do you see that as a problem when you read the Gospels? John 1:1-4? Colossians 1:5-12? Rev 17:7?

According to the Word of God it is the sin of man that brought suffering and death to creation (remember Romans 8?) - and it ends (according to the Good news of the Gospel - ) at the second coming.

In Christ,

Bob

 

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by BobRyan:
Since I already mentioned Romans 8 as a key part of the Gospel message of Paul that refutes such speculation - lets look at it.


18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
19 For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.
20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope
21 that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
22 For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.
23 And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Your response is notable for two things.

#1. A complete lack of any attempt to exegete the text of Romans 8 given above. Nothing in your response deals with the salient points of "nature" and "corruption" as given in Romans 8.

Clearly in recasting that as nothing more than a story of "human hopes" your argument is with Paul.

#2. Your response show total and complete "blind faith" in evolutionism and a complete lack of any interest in the NT Gospel message of Romans 8 as IT descirbes the anxious longing of Creation ITSELF.

Sadly this trade of humanism-for-Gospel is seen all to often in the stories told in the temples of evolutionism. I am sad to see how quickly you have adopted the trade off.

Amazing how Christians scholars keep exegeting these texts to contain the very meaning blind-faith-in-evolutionism so needs to ignore.

So death decay and corruption mentioned in Romans 8 seem to match with todays "extinction, extermination, death, disease, tooth-and-claw carnage" in nature.

But evolutionism "needs" that to be the meaning behind "God spoke and it was - He commanded and it stood firm". Evolution "needs" us to ignore the idea that "decay, corruption, death" came about because of the sin of man as stated by Paul.

In Christ,

Bob


In Christ,

Bob

 

It is "interesting" but is in fact "neutral" like states of equilibrium. It is not specific enough to argue for or against any of the models.

Now "IF" you had the ability to experiment with "creation" on various planets and had some "Rule" for the degree to which any given life form on a planet should share "basic" Genetic information storage then maybe you could start to speculate on "what God should have done".

So far you just have "your story" that you wish the degree of similarity in some measure of genetic structure should be less than 99%. As we know today genetic structure is not the entire "story" for how the end product is determined.

But it is instructive that you would take this opportunity to assume God can not work with such genetic structures in a six day creation sequence.

Almost as if you had a few 6 day sequences of your own and had proof that DNA relationships that you have observed 'should not be there'.

In Christ,

Bob

 

BobRyan,

What is "neutral" about this high degree of genetic similarity between humans and chimpanzees? You don't think 99% genetic identity is specific enough to argue for evolution? I find that position intellectually untenable.

I don't care to speculate that God "should" ever have done anything other than what He did. Perhaps you do. If you think it necessary to your literalist interpretation.

BobRyan, do you understand enough genetics to understand the possible way to code for the same proteins? Do you understand that 99% genetic similarity is enough that some folks (who I hope never do the experiment) hypothesize that it might be possible by mere artificial insemination to produce a chimp-human hybrid?

Well...I suppose that to you this is all coincidence.

I have made no such asumption that God could not work with such genetic structures in a six-day creation sequence. Merely that if God wanted us to conclude that evolution is false...this degree of genetic similarity would probably not be observed in the natural world. After all, God created the natural world. What observation of the natural world tells us...is really information we have from God.

BobRyan, if God were creating each species anew, He wouldn't even have to use the double-helix for all DNA. He wouldn't even have to use DNA as the genetic sequence for all non-viral organisms. If God chose the double-helix, there are multiple ways to code for the same protein sequence. The human and chimp sequences are even more similar than one would expect them to be if God just decided on the proteins they would make and randomly chose the sequences of DNA to code for them as mRNA on a per-species basis. I suppose you won't find that more than merely "interesting" either.

By the way, you didn't answer my question about what mtDNA predicted as to how long ago humans had a single parent. Probably because it doesn't support your worldview.

 

CalvinG;

When I referred to non-believers, I meant those who don't believe the Bible from a literal standpoint.

The promises of God are built on the foundation of Torah;

Once you separate God from His word, then ALL the promises are gone. If this (Genesis) is a lie (or exageration), then everything else, the commands, promises, prophecies, Messiah, salvation, resurrection, and the Kingdom of Heaven don't exist.

If what you say is true, then there is no reason to study God's word, anymore than reading Aesop's fables or Greek mythology.

Cotton

 

I love how Paul of Eugene and UTEOTW just ignore the above question... I guess the implications are unsettling and so they just ignore the data and move on... As do most "Christian" evolutionists. </font>[/QUOTE]The last chapters of Revelation I consider to be my hope and I consider them to be a promise from God.

But I don't take everything in there literally.

For example, the Holy City that descends from heaven is described as being very, very large. No problem there for me, but if we consider it to be a cube - and if we put a sphere the size of the moon superimposed on that cube - the corners of the cube will stick out above the surface of the sphere. Like giant mountains on the moon!

That's a pretty big city!

So then John said he was taken to a high mountain to watch that city come down from heaven to earth.

Mountains of earthly material, at any rate, can only go so high before squashing down of their own weight. The moon itself, you know, although made of solid rock, squashed itself into a spherical shape just under its own gravity.

So forgive me if I take this bit about being in a high mountain to see this take place to be non-literal.

I'm going to post a study outline of Revelation on my web site one of these days - maybe you'll look it over just for a good laugh </font>[/QUOTE]What makes you think that the New Jerusalem isn't shaped as a PYRAMID! The height at the apex being the same as it is square? That doesn't change what the Bible says. We don't have evey detail, but see GOD does provide insight. Evolutionists just choose to ignore what has been provided and reach their OWN conclusions.

 

Originally posted by Cotton:

Cotton, why do you believe that? Why does it all have to be literally true or none of it is remotely true? This seems to me an approach which would say that because something isn't 100% right about absolutely everything, it must be completely discarded. That isn't how I approach things. Why do you think this is necessary?

The pastors of my church happen to agree with you on this point, by the way. So I'm not saying or implying that you are alone or necessarily in bad company. And I don't deny that faith is a bit more difficult when one believes all of science.

You have given us your conclusion without the reasoning, cotton. Perhaps you can give me the reasoning so that your conclusion follows logically from your premises. (And I ask this because my own pastors didn't provide the reasoning when they preached about the necessity of believing literal-creation Genesis.) Are you concerned that folks would pick and choose what they like from the Bible in the manner of Thomas Jefferson? I'm not. Because it seems to me quite a different thing to reject a literal interpretation of what is likely transcribed oral history than to reject moral teachings.

 

Nothing wrong with it being a pyramid shape.

That's a perfectly legitimate explanation for the city dimensions.

Which is really what I had in mind when I said
"if" as in "if we consider it to be a cube".

Another, less likely possibility in my mind, is that the city is a sphere, making it a whole planet on its own. But that would mean it doesn't really come down and land on the new earth...

An even less likely possibility is that the city is a maze of smaller buildings that rest on a hill that rises up that high.

But I'll take whatever He provides without a single complaint about the architecture!

 

I don't have problems with possibilities WITHIN the context of the Bible. It is ONLY when people add to the BIBLE in an attempt at "new" revelations or they ignore the Bible and are motivated by irreverent theory (and I did spell that wrong). That is exactly as I see evolution
as it is presently presented in public schools ---
irreverent. It gives no space to Christianity, the Bible, or GOD. And those that express it don't even want Creationism understood. I find that IRREVERENT and IMMORAL.