"I chose YEC because..."

[humbledbyhim]

posting this to see why people chose YEC: Please, let enough people (at least 15) respond to the poll before mass debate ensues .

 

[KerrMetric]

You left out one clearcut choice. "Don't know any better"

 

[SeanSteele]

You left out one clearcut choice. "Don't know any better"

Do you think that such a post makes a person want to listen to you?

I'm not even going to try to debate you, but think for one second on this. An all knowing God would know that this debate would some day happen. Knowing this, would he not have made Genesis say that he created the earth over a long period of time if that were the case? Would he have wanted us fighting over this? Would it serve his purpose to devide his people? If he is not smart enough to see down the road, he is not smart enough to be God. I think he can see down the road and I really don't care if the non-believers laugh.

I Corinthians 3:19-20 (KJV) For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again, The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain.

 

[KerrMetric]

Do you think that such a post makes a person want to listen to you?

I'm not even going to try to debate you, but think for one second on this. An all knowing God would know that this debate would some day happen. Knowing this, would he not have made Genesis say that he created the earth over a long period of time if that were the case? Would he have wanted us fighting over this? Would it serve his purpose to devide his people? If he is not smart enough to see down the road, he is not smart enough to be God. I think he can see down the road and I really don't care if the non-believers laugh.

I Corinthians 3:19-20 (KJV) For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again, The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain.

Belief in God and belief in YEC are not the same thing.

And why do people get offended by me stating the biggest single reason by FAR in this entire debate which is lay people not knowing any better when it comes to a primarily scientific issue. I'd say that reason is at least 99% of the cause.

It's a fact, it might be unpalatable to some, but it is still a fact.

 

[Deamiter]

An all knowing God would know that this debate would some day happen. Knowing this, would he not have made Genesis say that he created the earth over a long period of time if that were the case? Would he have wanted us fighting over this? Would it serve his purpose to devide his people? If he is not smart enough to see down the road, he is not smart enough to be God.

By this logic, each and every theological division in the church is evidence of God's stupidity. Every... single... one!

Either God's incredibly stupid for an omnipotent deity, or us humans are flawed in our interpretation of scriptures. I tend to choose the latter and avoid claiming that if ANY one of my personal theological beliefs are incorrect, God's a moron. In short, I do NOT know with certainty how God intended us to interpret each passage in scripture. Because of this, I don't presume to claim that I can read God's mind and know what he would or would not have done.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

An all knowing God would know that this debate would some day happen. Knowing this, would he not have made Genesis say that he created the earth over a long period of time if that were the case?


We've seen this argument several times here. I'm going to label it the easter egg defense of the Bible. Named after the clever computer easter eggs that hide until someone with time heavy on their hands clicks in just the right place or types in the secret code.

With things in the church like Bible codes and numerlogy this kind of thinking is right on the surface. God will leave us special directions in the Bible for our time. Dispensational and premill thinking is riddled with this type of analysis. The problem is that it doesn't consider the generations of believers between the time Scripture was written and now. If they are messages to us then they are useless to those earlier people.

This almost the flip side of the YECist argument that the early Hebrews were not stupid, God could have told them about evolution (or quantum chromodynamics or statistical mechanics etc) if it was really true. In either case it is a mis-projection of the conditions of today into the distant past.


Would he have wanted us fighting over this? Would it serve his purpose to devide his people?

just add it to the list:
baptism-who, how, when, how much
church government
hermeneutics-covenant or dispensational
end times

appears to be division in the church whether you talk about origins or not. the issue doesn't even appear until the late 18thC and the rise of deep time in geology. Christianity had been fighting religious wars with the death of 1/4 of the population of Europe for about 150 years by then.

 

[laptoppop]

Back to the original topic.

I chose YEC because of two reasons.

1) I believe in a very conservative interpretation of Scripture. This includes a simple, literal interpretation, unless there are textual reasons to believe otherwise. There are significant times (such as when "the sun stood still") that the events are being described from the perspective of the viewer.

2) I believe YEC fits the observable evidence (the geologic column, etc.) much better than any other alternative.

 

[Jase]

Back to the original topic.

I chose YEC because of two reasons.



2) I believe YEC fits the observable evidence (the geologic column, etc.) much better than any other alternative.

Despite that it can be shown to you that the observable evidence in fact doesn't support the YEC view?

 

[steen]

Despite that it can be shown to you that the observable evidence in fact doesn't support the YEC view?

And this has indeed been shown to him

 

[laptoppop]

And this has indeed been shown to him

It should be self evident that I have not yet seen anything which is compelling. Statements such as "everyone knows" or declarations of determination without support do not hold much weight with me.

This is not to say that I will not see anything in the future. I continue to pray that the Lord will guide me into all truth, and I welcome ****respectful**** interchange of real data.

Scientific investigation, by its very nature, strongly tends to exclude any "super"natural explanations (i.e. God). For me, if two scenarios are equally possible, and one is much more in harmony with a conservative interpretation of Scripture -- then I will gravitate toward the that model.

In this case, I am not yet convinced that the two models for the formation of the geologic column, for example, are even equal. At this time I see the YEC explanation for the fossil record as significantly better at explaining the observable data.

 

[steen]

Is that why you completely ignored and skipped the scientific-reference supported examples provided in our discussion about the Greern River Varves?

 

[Willtor]

It should be self evident that I have not yet seen anything which is compelling. Statements such as "everyone knows" or declarations of determination without support do not hold much weight with me.

This is not to say that I will not see anything in the future. I continue to pray that the Lord will guide me into all truth, and I welcome ****respectful**** interchange of real data.

Scientific investigation, by its very nature, strongly tends to exclude any "super"natural explanations (i.e. God). For me, if two scenarios are equally possible, and one is much more in harmony with a conservative interpretation of Scripture -- then I will gravitate toward the that model.

In this case, I am not yet convinced that the two models for the formation of the geologic column, for example, are even equal. At this time I see the YEC explanation for the fossil record as significantly better at explaining the observable data.

The obvious concern is that one may come to value "conservatism" above truth (the same goes for "liberalism" or any other -ism). That a particular interpretation is better by virtue of being more conservative (in the American sense) is not such a strong argument. It would give some weight if it were conservative in the "orthodox" sense (it isn't), but even then it might be incorrect. In the end, picking an interpretation because it is consistent with "conservatism" (again, in the American sense), is not a particularly sound criterion. Certainly, it is questionable in overriding all other reason.

As for the geological column, it is telling to me that the very Christians who set out to establish the discoverability of a global flood from nature disproved it. Beyond that, there are all of the posts (with very simple math) that argue that a global flood would have sterilized the Earth. Why do you think that the YEC explanation for the fossil record is more sound?

 

[laptoppop]

Is that why you completely ignored and skipped the scientific-reference supported examples provided in our discussion about the Greern River Varves?

I don't want to hijack this thread any further - but I am still waiting for you to describe how the Green River catfish fossils can lie at the bottom for hundreds of years without decomposing. After that, we can discuss other issues, like how the mass of varves was formed. There are fine answers to that (which I believe you probably already know - Google is an easy tool) - but one of the problems is that we tend to get sucked into sidechannels and never fully deal with an issue.

 

[laptoppop]

The obvious concern is that one may come to value "conservatism" above truth (the same goes for "liberalism" or any other -ism). That a particular interpretation is better by virtue of being more conservative (in the American sense) is not such a strong argument. It would give some weight if it were conservative in the "orthodox" sense (it isn't), but even then it might be incorrect. In the end, picking an interpretation because it is consistent with "conservatism" (again, in the American sense), is not a particularly sound criterion. Certainly, it is questionable in overriding all other reason.

As for the geological column, it is telling to me that the very Christians who set out to establish the discoverability of a global flood from nature disproved it. Beyond that, there are all of the posts (with very simple math) that argue that a global flood would have sterilized the Earth. Why do you think that the YEC explanation for the fossil record is more sound?

I am not using "conservative" in a socio-political sense, but rather to indicate the school of Scriptural interpretation that tends to accept plain language interpretation over other methodologies. For example, as such I reject the JEDP theory of Genesis authorship, in favor of a Mosaic authorship.

People change opinions often. Others have gone from believing evolution to being YEC. When we all get home to be with the Lord, I'll buy a round of soda and we can laugh about how wrong I was on some points, and you on others. <grin>

"Why do you think that the YEC explanation for the fossil record is more sound?" --- Indeed, that is one of the crucial questions. We've talked about some of the issues -- but we all have day jobs and we're trading posts, not books. Some of the stronger points of evidence for me (off the top of my head) are the actual mechanisms proposed for the pysical formation of the column, the lack of transitionary forms (we need to discuss this in more detail -- one thing at a time), the size, scope and scale of certain deposits, the problems with mutations as source for the variation in natural selection, and others.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

but I am still waiting for you to describe how the Green River catfish fossils can lie at the bottom for hundreds of years without decomposing

i've seen this argument several times on YECists sites.
however:
1- flesh rots away
2- bones remain.
3- fossilization is a long process which requires burial.

so.
no bones become fossils on the floor of the lake. they remain bones. the flesh does decompose.
other than these two errors, what is the problem?

 

[laptoppop]

but I am still waiting for you to describe how the Green River catfish fossils can lie at the bottom for hundreds of years without decomposing

i've seen this argument several times on YECists sites.
however:
1- flesh rots away
2- bones remain.
3- fossilization is a long process which requires burial.

so.
no bones become fossils on the floor of the lake. they remain bones. the flesh does decompose.
other than these two errors, what is the problem?

The problem is twofold. One, we are dealing with fossils that transverse a large number of layers. If the layers are truly annual, then they laid there for a Looooong time. Even bones would have a problem with that -- although one could possibly postulate fossilation in place, but then you have a problem with an environment inhospitable to the plants. Of course, if the layers are not annual, there are no problems, but then the old earth chronological interpretation is challenged.
The second problem is that these fossils have a high degree of soft tissue (such as fins) preserved as well - not just bones.
-lee-

 

[Assyrian]

A quick google threw up Glen Morton's article on the Green River varves and the fossilised catfish. It is well worth a look. http://home.entouch.net/dmd/greenriver.htm

1) I believe in a very conservative interpretation of Scripture. This includes a simple, literal interpretation, unless there are textual reasons to believe otherwise. There are significant times (such as when "the sun stood still") that the events are being described from the perspective of the viewer.

The odd thing here is that people only realised this was significant when science showed us it was the earth that moved. Before that the simply literal interpretation was that the sun moved around the earth and stopped for Joshua. Simple, literal, but wrong.

Now the science tells us the earth is billions of years old. Why not do what our forefathers in he faith did when they learned the earth really moved round the sun? Look to see if we have been misinterpreting God's word with our simple literal approach.

 

[Assyrian]

I am not using "conservative" in a socio-political sense, but rather to indicate the school of Scriptural interpretation that tends to accept plain language interpretation over other methodologies. For example, as such I reject the JEDP theory of Genesis authorship, in favor of a Mosaic authorship.

I have no problem with the mosaic authorship, or editorship of Genesis. In fact I think it makes the TE position much stronger because the only references to a six day creation in the whole bible are when Moses uses it as an illustration of the Sabbath, and Moses is the one who warns us not to take God's day literally in Psalm 90.

 

[laptoppop]

I've seen the Morton article before. It has some good information, and is nicely written. However, it does not address the core issue in this particular case. The catfish fossils transverse a large number of "annual" layers -- way more layers than can be described as "cold water" aiding preservation. The bulk of the fossils are found in a layer 18" thick with about 4,000 layers. Either the layers are not annual, or the fish did not decompose for over a hundred years.

"science tells us"..... this is a very broad statement, and overlooks competing evidence such as the RATE project by ICR which challenges many of the basic presuppositions. It also ignores problem areas for old earth interpretation, such as the salinity of the ocean or the earth's magnetic field, which at best require secondary modifications to a uniformtarian interpretation.

 

[laptoppop]

I have no problem with the mosaic authorship, or editorship of Genesis. In fact I think it makes the TE position much stronger because the only references to a six day creation in the whole bible are when Moses uses it as an illustration of the Sabbath, and Moses is the one who warns us not to take God's day literally in Psalm 90.

Uh oh! A point of agreement? Can we do that here? <grin>
In Ps. 90, Moses is referring to God's perspective of time. I don't see how that affects Gen 1-- written for man.
Of course, another support for a more literal reading of Genesis is Jesus' geneaology in Luke 3. It goes all the way back to Adam, implying Adam was a real person, and the events were as described. There's a thread in the TE area (where I am careful about posting) that gives a more spiritualized interpretation, but to me the list is pretty compelling.