How literally do you take the creation story?

[urroner]

You claim the current apparent (as opposed to the actual) age of the earth is not deceptive, but that the fully formed state it is in naturally possesses the apparent age of a much older earth. This is what you are claiming right? In response to questions about why God would make the earth look older than it is?

My next question if I am correct in interpreting your position is why does a fully formed earth look so aged when it's not?

A fully formed man at the age of 21 looks 21, not 65. A fully formed man of 65, looks 65 not 21.

I would think that a fully formed earth that is only 6000 years old would still look only 6000 years old instead of much, much older.

Why would God want to make a world look older than it really is? A show of power is a poor reason to do so. What would it accomplish other than creating a distrust of Him?

[Brade]

Why create for 6 days? Isn't that rather obvious? He used it to demonstrate to us that we are to work 6 days, and rest one day. Understand, Yes, he could have done it in all in a micro-second.

Why not 6 hours with one hour of rest. Or, 8 days with 2 days of rest. Or 6 weeks with 1 week of rest. Or 6 years with 1 year of rest. Or 4 days with 1 day of rest. Or 4 days with a half day of rest. Or 2 days with 1 day of rest. Why is 6 days with 1 day of rest so obvious? I just don't see it. Sorry.

[semlogo]

Why would God want to make a world look older than it really is? A show of power is a poor reason to do so. What would it accomplish other than creating a distrust of Him?

[Hughes]

You claim the current apparent (as opposed to the actual) age of the earth is not deceptive, but that the fully formed state it is in naturally possesses the apparent age of a much older earth. This is what you are claiming right? In response to questions about why God would make the earth look older than it is?

My next question if I am correct in interpreting your position is why does a fully formed earth look so aged when it's not?

A fully formed man at the age of 21 looks 21, not 65. A fully formed man of 65, looks 65 not 21.

I would think that a fully formed earth that is only 6000 years old would still look only 6000 years old instead of much, much older.

"Look" is a subjective term or idea.

The Earth was created with the appearance of being fully grown (perfect if you will). For example, if you had met Adam and Eve only a couple days after creation, you would have thought they were 24 or something. But, in reality they are only a couple days old. So... how the "Look" can be deceptive, if that's your sole or primary way of judging age.

Same problem with anything in the or on the Earth after creation week. If you looked around, you might make the assumption that the creation around you had been there at least a thousand years or so. But, you'd be incorrect as you would be basing it on what you "see" and not understanding who made it.

The question of origins is a philosophical question. And to enter into the question without asking "who" and only what it "looks" like leads to only a partial picture of what happened.

[semlogo]

"Look" is a subjective term or idea.

The Earth was created with the appearance of being fully grown (perfect if you will). For example, if you had met Adam and Eve only a couple days after creation, you would have thought they were 24 or something. But, in reality they are only a couple days old. So... how the "Look" can be deceptive, if that's your sole or primary way of judging age.

Same problem with anything in the or on the Earth after creation week. If you looked around, you might make the assumption that the creation around you had been there at least a thousand years or so. But, you'd be incorrect as you would be basing it on what you "see" and not understanding who made it.

The question of origins is a philosophical question. And to enter into the question without asking "who" and only what it "looks" like leads to only a partial picture of what happened.

This is a very long-winded way of saying, "God lied to us, and I'm okay with that." At least the old "the devil put dinosaur bones in the earth to confuse us!" hypothesis was more consistent with character.

[Hughes]

Why would God want to make a world look older than it really is? A show of power is a poor reason to do so. What would it accomplish other than creating a distrust of Him?

How would you do it any different. The point isn't to create the appearance of age to be deceptive, but to create function. Stars/Moon/Sun all have a function. If they aren't fully functional at the point of their creation, then you have to wait, and if you're all powerful, why create such a situation?

And if you're creating a person to have fellowship with (Adam and Eve) what's the point of creating them to appear only 1 day old (as a baby) when you could just as easily create them fully functioning as an adult?

In essence, what's the point of doing a work of creation in the first place?

[semlogo]

How would you do it any different. The point isn't to create the appearance of age to be deceptive, but to create function. Stars/Moon/Sun all have a function. If they aren't fully functional at the point of their creation, then you have to wait, and if you're all powerful, why create such a situation?

And if you're creating a person to have fellowship with (Adam and Eve) what's the point of creating them to appear only 1 day old (as a baby) when you could just as easily create them fully functioning as an adult?

In essence, what's the point of doing a work of creation in the first place?

If the planet were formed fully functional in less than a week, then it would appear to be its exact age. There would be evidence to that effect. It appears old because it IS old, and was formed by slow processes. If it were formed quickly there would be evidence of a quick formation, not evidence of a slow formation

[Hughes]

Why not 6 hours with one hour of rest. Or, 8 days with 2 days of rest. Or 6 weeks with 1 week of rest. Or 6 years with 1 year of rest. Or 4 days with 1 day of rest. Or 4 days with a half day of rest. Or 2 days with 1 day of rest. Why is 6 days with 1 day of rest so obvious? I just don't see it. Sorry.

That's a good question. Why did he pick the form and function that he did. He started from scratch. HE's the creator of the laws of physics as well. Why gravity? Why the strong and weak nuclear forces? The variables are literally endless. But, at some point the creator had to set things up so that it all fits together, and so it functions.

So. Why a 7 day week? Why a 6 day work week with one day of rest? Well, at that point it is simply the way he set it up. It very well could be that it's how he wanted us to function. More active by 6 times, than inactive. Of course I'm just guessing.

There are probably millions of arbitrary choices the creator made just so things function. Why 14.7 pounds for atmospheric pressure? Why breath air?

The flip side is also true though. Why not?

[SilverKnight]

Hughes & Other Young Earth Creationists,

Which of these two scenarios seems more believable:

1. God created the earth in 6 days, a mere 6000 years ago, then engages in a massive cover-up to obscure every last shred of evidence (every rock, every mountain, every beach, every desert, every fossil, indeed every subatomic particle he has created) and make it appear like it took much, much longer.

2. God created the earth through a very slow process that took billions of years.

[Hughes]

This is a very long-winded way of saying, "God lied to us, and I'm okay with that." At least the old "the devil put dinosaur bones in the earth to confuse us!" hypothesis was more consistent with character.

And if you were all powerful how would you do it?

[Hughes]

If the planet were formed fully functional in less than a week, then it would appear to be its exact age. There would be evidence to that effect. It appears old because it IS old, and was formed by slow processes. If it were formed quickly there would be evidence of a quick formation, not evidence of a slow formation

And it's very possible there was... and now thousands of years later, what evidence is there that you think would be different from what we see today? In essence, what do you see as evidence that it could have only formed slowly?

[semlogo]

And if you were all powerful how would you do it?

Not sure, though. Moot point - God isn't all powerful. If I were God, I'd do it the most efficient way possible - let natural processes do their work.

[Zakuska]

If the planet were formed fully functional in less than a week, then it would appear to be its exact age. There would be evidence to that effect. It appears old because it IS old, and was formed by slow processes. If it were formed quickly there would be evidence of a quick formation, not evidence of a slow formation

Ah... You mean slow like fossilized trees spaning sediments of over 20 million years?

[semlogo]

And it's very possible there was... and now thousands of years later, what evidence is there that you think would be different from what we see today? In essence, what do you see as evidence that it could have only formed slowly?

ALL the evidence says it formed slowly. Every single piece of dating methodology we have agrees. The very composition of the planet. The ice core samples. The composition of the earth. Observation of the formation of other solar systems. It all says "old earth."

If the earth were young, all the dating methods would show that. We wouldn't have 800,000 year old ice core samples, each year marked by a tree-like ring. If god simply formed the glaciers all at once, he wouldn't need to create fake layers - he'd create the whole mass at once, and our oldest layers would have started 6,000 years ago with the annual cycles. Or if you think of Adam - what would he look like? He wouldn't have a belly button. He wouldn't have a mended crack in his arm bones from a childhood injury. There would be certain tell tale signs that Adam wasn't born as a baby. The same goes for the earth.

[Zakuska]

Hughes & Other Young Earth Creationists,

Which of these two scenarios seems more believable:

1. God created the earth in 6 days, a mere 6000 years ago, then engages in a massive cover-up to obscure every last shred of evidence (every rock, every mountain, every beach, every desert, every fossil, indeed every subatomic particle he has created) and make it appear like it took much, much longer.

2. God created the earth through a very slow process that took billions of years.

For the record... Im not promoting a 6000 year old earth. I just think that Like Columbus misjudging the size of the globe, that the truth is some where in between the creationists AND the evolutionsist.

[Zakuska]

ALL the evidence says it formed slowly. Every single piece of dating methodology we have agrees. The very composition of the planet. The ice core samples. The composition of the earth. Observation of the formation of other solar systems. It all says "old earth."

If the earth were young, all the dating methods would show that. We wouldn't have 800,000 year old ice core samples, each year marked by a tree-like ring. If god simply formed the glaciers all at once, he wouldn't need to create fake layers - he'd create the whole mass at once, and our oldest layers would have started 6,000 years ago with the annual cycles. Or if you think of Adam - what would he look like? He wouldn't have a belly button. He wouldn't have a mended crack in his arm bones from a childhood injury. There would be certain tell tale signs that Adam wasn't born as a baby. The same goes for the earth.

Your'e assuming that God didn't know all this and put the layers of ice with the correct amounts of those CO2 molecules in each.

Of course when one reads the account of creation in the book of Moses and how God "Watched and waited" until everything obeyed until he moved on to the next period of creation. it makes a little more sense.

[thesometimesaint]

Zakuska:

False equivalency. IE. If you mistakenly say that 25-19=7, and I say it is 48,823 we are both technically wrong. But yours is most likely a small mistake in calculation. My answer isn't even of the same planet.

Ps. I see little point to a God trying to deceive his children.

[semlogo]

Your'e assuming that God didn't know all this and put the layers of ice with the correct amounts of those CO2 molecules in each.

Does not follow.

[Zakuska]

Ps. I see little point to a God trying to deceive his children.

As do I.

However... You need to remember what it is God is testing for. If God is testing for the "strength of ones faith" even in the face of adversity as the scriptures attest too. What better way to test it than to stack the deck in opposition and see at what point it breaks?

[semlogo]

As do I.

However... You need to remember what it is God is testing for. If God is testing for the "strength of ones faith" even in the face of adversity as the scriptures attest too. What better way to test it than to stack the deck in opposition and see at what point it breaks?

That's ridiculous. That's not a test of faith in God, but rather a test of faith in Kurt Cameron. Not to mention bizarrely rewarding rather stupid credulity based on a lack of intellectual curiosity or indeed intellect, instead of true faith.

[SilverKnight]

What better way to test it than to stack the deck in opposition and see at what point it breaks?

[thesometimesaint]

Zakuska:

The test is to see if I will do whatsoever my Lord my God will command. There is no requirement that I believe anything that is not true. That being said. Is it possible that God created the Heavens and the Earth 7000 years ago and then deliberately placed all the evidence in such a way to show a much much older heaven and earth? Yes, it is possible. But I find that type of God nonsensical, and deceiving.

[ERayR]

Zakuska:

The test is to see if I will do whatsoever my Lord my God will command. There is no requirement that I believe anything that is not true. That being said. Is it possible that God created the Heavens and the Earth 7000 years ago and then deliberately placed all the evidence in such a way to show a much much older heaven and earth? Yes, it is possible. But I find that type of God nonsensical, and deceiving.

I think the crearion story is just fine. It's the personal interpretations and assumptions that cause the problems. I do not believe in a young earth nor do I accept macro-evolution. There is a whole lot of misintrpreted information in both camps. I believe that God created the earth and its system. How long ago and how is not clear. I believe that God's children were placed in this creation through a fall and not through an assention. Exactly how long ago is again unclear.

[David T]

Moreover, it is taught that since death was always here, and a natural condition prevailing throughout all space, there could not possibly come a redemption from Adam

[Ceeboo]

God isn't all powerful.

Could we settle on God being "kida-sorta-a wee bit" powerful?

Peace,

Ceeboo