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Challenge Issued: Arguments for YEC

Shermana

Heretic
Yeah I shouldn't have posted that last one, except for the reference that there are "researched refutations".

That particular article is more of a reference point to other works, if we were to debate an issue like say, comets,

Comets and the Age of the Solar System - Answers in Genesis

Then we'd have an actual article with a lot of sources and references to debate. If anything, I think the preservation of animal feces is one of the least "full of $@%T" arguments. If not for a sudden flash destruction, that should have been eaten like, well, flies on $@%T.
 

Looncall

Well-Known Member
Yeah I shouldn't have posted that last one, except for the reference that there are "researched refutations".

That particular article is more of a reference point to other works, if we were to debate an issue like say, comets,

Comets and the Age of the Solar System - Answers in Genesis

Then we'd have an actual article with a lot of sources and references to debate. If anything, I think the preservation of animal feces is one of the least "full of $@%T" arguments. If not for a sudden flash destruction, that should have been eaten like, well, flies on $@%T.

Balderdash. Flash destruction happens all over the place, all the time. Haven't you noticed the floods on the news in the last few years.

It is likely that if you dig in your garden, if you have one, you will encounter layers from the time of the supposed flood. You will not see any sign of disruption.

Believing in the biblical flood is an inanity of epic (biblical?) proportions.
 

Shermana

Heretic
Ah, you failed to notice the mudslides, then.

No, rather you seem to have failed to notice that there are lots of creatures in the mud who would thrive in such a mudslide that would happily find such waste products to be a grand feast.
 

Monk Of Reason

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
Yes, however I wouldn't say its vague. It is referencing books, obviously a sales pitch for them, but I do imagine those books are well sourced that it's referencing, and I'll check those out in a bit. Let's go over each of the talking points that we can, and I will see if I can find an online version which pertains the relevant details and sources.
Well thats what I'm after. The source of their claims. What is the evidence or studies behind them. It did feel more like a sales pitch than an actual informative discussion.

I am not entirely familiar with the flaws in the dating methods, but I might even consider buying this book since it's one of the primary corner stones of the Old-Earth arguments and I'd like to see what the specifics are in this regard, though considering its technical nature it may take me a bit to fully be able to use it.

I have herad of several people misusing dating methods and then claimed that the methods themselves were falwed. They were found out and proven wrong and excluding incidents like this I haven't been able to find any major discrepancies or miscalcuations created by incorrect dating methods.


And I read some of those claims but I still haven't seen what they say to back it up. The whole of geology seems to dissagree with them and the case to be made to upheave not only all of biology and geology isn't there. Or at least I haven't seen the evidence yet.

And the last part just seems like a claim. Not real evidence. "Why" does it scream global flood?
 

Monk Of Reason

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
Yeah I shouldn't have posted that last one, except for the reference that there are "researched refutations".

That particular article is more of a reference point to other works, if we were to debate an issue like say, comets,

Comets and the Age of the Solar System - Answers in Genesis

Then we'd have an actual article with a lot of sources and references to debate. If anything, I think the preservation of animal feces is one of the least "full of $@%T" arguments. If not for a sudden flash destruction, that should have been eaten like, well, flies on $@%T.


Specifically on the comets I have a few problems. Specifically this quote in the article.

Because no source of creation for comets has been identified, comets are assumed to be primordial.

Who assumes they are primordial? We seem to know exactly how they form and the calculations that are used to predict them.
http://www.space.com/53-comets-formation-discovery-and-exploration.html

And I agree with you on the part of it being incredibly difficult for dead things to not be destroyed or eaten. That is why fossils are so rare. That is why there are "holes" in the fossil record.

If not then we would have fossils all around us everywhere we step. ITs also why we find fossils usually in clumps at arechological sites.
 

ruffen

Active Member
For a person to seriously believe the Universe to be less than 10,000 years old, one would have to not understand:


- how planets form and how we know how planets form, how much time that takes and how we know how old our own planet is

- how big the Universe is and how (relatively) slowly light travels and therefore how old it must be simply for us to be able to see distant galaxies - for us to see a galaxy 2,5 million light-years
away, the Universe must be at least 2,5 million years old, unless God planted fake photons from those galaxies heading towards Earth just to fool us and make the Universe seem old and vast so that it would seem like it came into being by natural processes billions of years ago, and hide the fact that he created it just thousands of years ago

- how long time the Moon and other bodies must have been exposed to bombardment to get the extreme amount of craters that they have

- how continental drift works and the geological evidence for now separate continents having been joined millions of years ago

- how the fossil record shows similar species where said continents were joined, and how the separate fossil dating agrees with said geological dating

- how DNA in current species show similarities where said continents were joined and how the time it must have taken for evolution to diversify them from common ancestors also agrees with said geological and fossil dating

- how orbital mechanics shows that Neptune's moon, Triton, which is in retrograde orbit, must have used millions if not billions of years to get its extremely circular and slowly decaying orbit (of course God could have created it like that to make it seem natural and hide the fact that he created it)

- how star clusters like the Pleiades, still embedded in the gas clouds that the stars formed from, indicate a God who deliberately placed star clusters ("cosmic nurseries") inside hydrogen clouds to make it seem natural and hide the fact that he created them

- how much we know about stellar evolution and the precision of dating the age of our own Sun, and how God must have deliberately created a star that looked 4-5 billion years old to make it seem natural and hide the fact that he created it

- how much we know about galaxy formation and how deep into space (and due to said slow light-speed, back into time) we can see, and how this shows early galaxies far out and more developed galaxies closer to us due to the delay of light arriving to us, and how God must have created every galaxy in this special way to make them look natural and hide the fact that he created them

- how the expansion of the Universe shows us that it must have been much smaller a long time ago, and that the dating of the time when it was tiny is almost 14 billion years ago

- how this figure corresponds to the distances to distant galaxies so that when one accounts for the expansion of space, the horizon of the observable Universe is where it should be if the Universe is almost 14 billion years old

- how the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation is photons that were released in the early Universe, but didn't propagate freely through space when it was too dense and hot (plasma, which is opaque to electromagnetic radiation), so the release of these photons must have happened when the Universe cooled just enough for electrons to attach to nuclei

- how the stretching and expansion of space over almost 14 billion years leads to a predicted cooling to just about 2.5-3.0K, and that the observed radiation at 2.72548±0.00057 K not only confirms the age and expansion rate of the Universe, but also shows a nearly perfect black-body spectrum which indicates that the young Universe had quite (but not completely) uniform temperature


Basically, to believe in a young Earth creation myth, one must be blind and deaf to the scientific knowledge gained over the last several centuries. I can understand that people would believe that a millennium or two ago, but it baffles me that such stupidity seems to thrive in 2013.
 

Shermana

Heretic
Specifically on the comets I have a few problems. Specifically this quote in the article.



Who assumes they are primordial? We seem to know exactly how they form and the calculations that are used to predict them.
http://www.space.com/53-comets-formation-discovery-and-exploration.html

And I agree with you on the part of it being incredibly difficult for dead things to not be destroyed or eaten. That is why fossils are so rare. That is why there are "holes" in the fossil record.

If not then we would have fossils all around us everywhere we step. ITs also why we find fossils usually in clumps at arechological sites.

Where did you get the idea that we "Know exactly" how they form? From that link which says:

Formation

Astronomers think comets are leftovers from the gas, dust, ice and rocks that initially formed the solar system about 4.6 billion years ago.

Now, is that website aware of the whole issue of them going around the sun?

http://cseligman.com/text/ssevolve/cometorigin.htm
 
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Monk Of Reason

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
Where did you get the idea that we "Know exactly" how they form? From that link which says:



Now, is that website aware of the whole issue of them going around the sun?

The Origin of the Comets
I mean that we have a decent understanding of how comets form. Though honestly its a non-issue. The "problem" of them going around the sun still doesn't seem to be an issue either.

The question I will ask you real quick before we go any futher..

If someone makes a calculation based on assumptions that comes out different than what the leading theory states which holds more weight? The calculation that may very well be wrong and doesn't have hard data behind it (rather its assumed or infered and in this case, off of incorrect assumptions and inferences) or the theory that has several different sources of evidence. We know that comets exist, we have a good idea as to how they started and we know from a plethura of differen sources that the earth is far older than 10k years old and the universe older still.
 

Shermana

Heretic
I mean that we have a decent understanding of how comets form. Though honestly its a non-issue. The "problem" of them going around the sun still doesn't seem to be an issue either.

Not really. We have guesses with big giant holes in those guesses. Why doesn't it seem to be an issue to you?

The question I will ask you real quick before we go any futher..

If someone makes a calculation based on assumptions that comes out different than what the leading theory states which holds more weight? The calculation that may very well be wrong and doesn't have hard data behind it (rather its assumed or infered and in this case, off of incorrect assumptions and inferences) or the theory that has several different sources of evidence. We know that comets exist, we have a good idea as to how they started and we know from a plethura of differen sources that the earth is far older than 10k years old and the universe older still.
[/QUOTE]

I take it you're basically backing away from the prospect of having an examination of these theories in light of calculations and evaluations that actually address the details and want to revert to the rabbit hole of the issue of authority trumping any attempt to poke holes in the mainstream. Now if these calculations and inferences were in fact based on "incorrect assumptions" that you were able to prove were completely "incorrect" and based on provenly flawed interpretations, and if you were able to prove that the theories in question are impregnable and based on un-disprovable consistent evidence, you'd have a point. They would have more weight. But I don't think you're completely familiar with just how "Weighty" the "evidence" and "theories" that hold the mainstream constructs together actually are.

If you're not willing to have an objective examination of the data and concepts I do present which have actual backing, we have nothing more to discuss really. I don't really see much of the point of the post except a deceptive non-challenge. If your entire point is to write off things as incorrect and non-evidenced and to paint the status quo as proven and beyond doubt, there's really no point in carrying this further.

Otherwise, if I saw that the data in question was completely unshakeable, and the alternative ideas and calculations were completely dodgy, of course I'd accept that the "Mainstream" view is as impregnable as you might say. I'd take the Evolutionary Theism approach. But I don't for a reason. And it's not just because I "don't like science". It's because there are holes in the story on every level from biology to astronomy to oceanography to geology and beyond, that the mainstream does not like to address. If it works to write this off as "Conspiracy theory", oh well, we can leave it at that.
 
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McBell

Unbound
Not really. We have guesses with big giant holes in those guesses. Why doesn't it seem to be an issue to you?

I take it you're basically backing away from the prospect of having an examination of these theories in light of calculations and evaluations that actually address the details and want to revert to the rabbit hole of the issue of authority trumping any attempt to poke holes in the mainstream. Now if these calculations and inferences were in fact based on "incorrect assumptions" that you were able to prove were completely "incorrect" and based on provenly flawed interpretations, and if you were able to prove that the theories in question are impregnable and based on un-disprovable consistent evidence, you'd have a point. They would have more weight. But I don't think you're completely familiar with just how "Weighty" the "evidence" and "theories" that hold the mainstream constructs together actually are.

If you're not willing to have an objective examination of the data and concepts I do present which have actual backing, we have nothing more to discuss really. I don't really see much of the point of the post except a deceptive non-challenge. If your entire point is to write off things as incorrect and non-evidenced and to paint the status quo as proven and beyond doubt, there's really no point in carrying this further.

Otherwise, if I saw that the data in question was completely unshakeable, and the alternative ideas and calculations were completely dodgy, of course I'd accept that the "Mainstream" view is as impregnable as you might say. I'd take the Evolutionary Theism approach. But I don't for a reason. And it's not just because I "don't like science". It's because there are holes in the story on every level from biology to astronomy to oceanography to geology and beyond, that the mainstream does not like to address. If it works to write this off as "Conspiracy theory", oh well, we can leave it at that.

One wonders why you do not hold your chosen alternative to the "mainstream" to the same standards?

I mean, it is a nice little speech and all, but it seems to be revealing a rather dubious double standard.
 
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Shermana

Heretic
One wonders why you do not hold your chosen alternative to the "mainstream" to the same standards?

I mean, it is a nice little speech and all, but it seems to be revealing a rather dubious double standard.

Because the actual data, Watson.
 

Shermana

Heretic
That can't possibly justify employing a double-standard here; i.e. holding some views to a higher standard because they are "mainstream", but then taking a lackadaisical and slipshod approach to your pet alternative.

So the specifics in question can't possibly justify a non-existent double standard? What exactly is this double-standard in question?

The reason these theories are in doubt is because the data is suspect in the first place, and doesn't hold in the face of data, especially from secular sources, that flies in the face otherwise. The "pet mainstream" is oftentimes based on far less substantial, objective criteria than you'd like to believe.

Believe it or not, mainstream theories have in fact been changed, oftentimes quite begrudgingly, in the face of new evidence, and it turns out the "evidence" those old theories were based on turned out to be bunk. Also, many theories have been shown to be full of errors and contradictions as well, such as for example certain Astronomical models that are constantly in a flux of change. I know it's hard to believe science isn't always based on perfect honesty devoid of confirmation biases and vested interests, but it happens.
 

apophenia

Well-Known Member
If you are not able to naturally do this, you may want to try ingesting large amounts of alcohol and drugs for an extended period of time, combined with a regimen of bashing your skull against hard objects for an hour a day. Over time, you may do enough damage to your brain, that YEC arguments will start to seem both coherent and convincing to you.

That is what I have done for decades, and I still dont believe the bible or quran. Are sterner measures required ?
 

Shermana

Heretic
You're still ducking and dodging the question.

How so? I specifically asked you to explain your assertion.

Otherwise, you're presenting a false dichotomy.

I might as well ask if you've stopped crapping your pants. Or beating your wife.

Loaded questions with false premises will get you nowhere...except further proving my case.
 
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Monk Of Reason

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
Not really. We have guesses with big giant holes in those guesses. Why doesn't it seem to be an issue to you?
Because we don't know the majority of things. Its a complex issue. We don't "have" to know everything. Though all of our guessse are based on hard evidence. So no I don't see a problem.
I take it you're basically backing away from the prospect of having an examination of these theories in light of calculations and evaluations that actually address the details and want to revert to the rabbit hole of the issue of authority trumping any attempt to poke holes in the mainstream.
I would like to stop you right here so I can make a point. I'm not appealing to Authority. No where have I ever said "well we're right because we're right". That is appeal to authority. What I am doing is called weighing evidence.

I'm still reading in on this comet "problem" you have posted on several different sources. I am doing so while in the middle of responding to this very post actually. But what the "problem" does is raise an intresting point. However a single iota of interesting evidence based on a calculation that sees a discrepancy between the timeframe that we have theorized for comets and the calculation of how long they have before they crash into the sun isn't a end all issue for the evidence.

Its based on many things.
1) Are the calculations correct? I haven't done the math but I will continue the debate under the assumption that they are correct.

2) Is the premis of the calculations correct? I'm still looking into it but lets still continue as if they are.

3) Are all factors calculated? This is a big one. Nothing in the calculations talk about variables or how things could have started or explinations. Its simply a talk about a base calculation based on what I assume is a correct premis without the additions of other factros.

4) If all of the factors are included that we know of and there is still a discrepancy we need to look at why?

So now we have a few possiblities if all of these are correct. First we have to verify that results by compairing them to other calculations to make sure that they can be trusted. If this is the one calculation that is off compaired to everything that fits in a neat little cordinance then we have to question why.

Your first assumption seems to be that we throw out the entierty of the theory an go with "young earth" theory. This is flawed because of the dmeonstrable evidence against young earth.

Instead we should look at the possiblity that we are missing factors. If we conclude that there are no factors missing then we need go to the final option.

Re-think our theory on how comets were formed. Its highly possible that the comets were formed later if there are no other possible factors or misunderstood evidences that would lead them to be older celestial bodies.

Dose that make sense?

Now if these calculations and inferences were in fact based on "incorrect assumptions" that you were able to prove were completely "incorrect" and based on provenly flawed interpretations, and if you were able to prove that the theories in question are impregnable and based on un-disprovable consistent evidence, you'd have a point. They would have more weight. But I don't think you're completely familiar with just how "Weighty" the "evidence" and "theories" that hold the mainstream constructs together actually are.

On the contrary. Specifically on comets I'm still researching. Its an interesting read if nothing else.

Here is something I would like for you to read in contrast to the evidence you provided.

How Were the Comets Made? » American Scientist

If you're not willing to have an objective examination of the data and concepts I do present which have actual backing, we have nothing more to discuss really. I don't really see much of the point of the post except a deceptive non-challenge. If your entire point is to write off things as incorrect and non-evidenced and to paint the status quo as proven and beyond doubt, there's really no point in carrying this further.
If I start doing that then I should stop. But at the same time I will point out if evidence that has been presented is faulty or misused in any way. That ist he point of this thread is to examine the evidence.

Just because I don't accept the evidence of find fault in doesn't meant that I'm simply writing it off because its creationism. Its because it has genuinily failed to uphold as strong evidence. Now I have done some reading and it seems that there are a few problems with the evidence presented for comets.

The first is that comets are not "primoridal". In fact its theorized that they are created in already existing sections of our cosmos from high powered collisions. So I don't see any reason to accept the idea that they must have been created at the same time as everything else.

Secondly the information that I have found specifically states that there are two distinct types of comets. Long term and short term orbiting comets. The difference is a short term comet's orbit is less than 200 years and a long term comet is more than 200 years for an orbrit. Some comets in fact have orbits that take several thousand earth years. So this immediatly debunks the idea that no comet could have survived more than 10,000 years unless they assume that it takes 10 or less orbits to crash into the sun.

Lastly there is already working into the theory that Jupiter and other large planets "capture" comets and can change their orbits drastically. This can work in favor to shorten their orbits or lengthen them. This factor was not introduced at all in the link that you provided for the calculations.


So I will continue to examine the evidence you put forth with scrutiny but I will be fair. The obsticals you must overcome now for this specific piece of evidence is to provide;
1-why is it assumed they are primordial?
2-how do they explain the calculations based on long term orbiting comets (orbits lasting longer than 200 years)
3-How does the math look when you add in the gravitational pull and sling of large planets such as Jupiter and saturn?

Or we can move onto another issue. I"m fine with either.

Otherwise, if I saw that the data in question was completely unshakeable, and the alternative ideas and calculations were completely dodgy, of course I'd accept that the "Mainstream" view is as impregnable as you might say. I'd take the Evolutionary Theism approach. But I don't for a reason. And it's not just because I "don't like science". It's because there are holes in the story on every level from biology to astronomy to oceanography to geology and beyond, that the mainstream does not like to address. If it works to write this off as "Conspiracy theory", oh well, we can leave it at that.


Well you need evidence to support your claims that science is full of gaping holes. We can jump back into evolution if you would like. Or you can bring others in. I would like to see evidences to the contrary of current theories that do provide evidence for creationism.

There are holes in science but that has always been so and always will be. The reason is because we don't know everything. But holes doesn't mean "incorrect" it means "not known yet". But contradicting evidence is another matter. Contradicting evidence is powerful.

Thats why I want evidence FOR creationism.
 

Enai de a lukal

Well-Known Member
How so? I specifically asked you to explain your assertion.

Otherwise, you're presenting a false dichotomy.

I might as well ask if you've stopped crapping your pants. Or beating your wife.

Loaded questions with false premises will get you nowhere...except further proving my case.

I thought it was obvious. If you were to hold the criteria you're employing for evaluating evolutionary theory to ID or creationism, clearly they fare far less well than evolutionary theory. And yet, unless I'm mistaken, that's what you're endorsing, yes, some form of ID/creationism? But you're not willing to hold it to the same standards you seem to want to hold rival theories- I'd imagine because you know that ID cannot stand up to ANY form of critical scrutiny- and thus the accusation of a double-standard.
 
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