Actual science is all in this state. It only goes by today's laws. There could be no actual science that I can think of off hand, that tells us about what things were like under different laws!
Ah, but there are a bunch of things that all fit together.
Against my better judgement, I will try to explain it to you, although I fully expect you to just post a reply along the lines of "Nuh uh, you're wrong!" and leave it at that...
I go into my bathroom, put the plug in the bathtub, and turn the tap on. I wait until the bath is full right to the brim, then I immediately turn the tap off and walk out, turning off the light and closing the door.
If you come into the bathroom later, can you figure out how long it has been since I was in there?
Well, the answer is yes, in several ways.
Let's say the bathtub has a slow leak because the plug doesn't make a perfect seal. Over time, the water will slowly drain out of the tub until it is all gone. You can come in and measure the rate of this leak. Let's say you find that the water leaks out at the rate of one liter every five minutes. Now, you can measure the total volume of the bathtub, how much water it can hold when it is completely full (you know that the bath was filled completely because some of the water had overflowed and dripped over the side). You get a result of 200 liters when it is full to the brim. But you notice that the water has fallen a bit. So you can measure the amount of water that is actually in the bath (it's simple high school maths at most), and you find that there is currently 190 liters of water in the tub. So, you know that the volume has gone down ten liters. Since you know how much water has been lost, and you know how quickly it is lost, you know that the tub was full ten minutes ago.
But there are other ways. You can feel that the lightbulb is warm. So, you know that it was on, but has been off for a while. You can measure the temperature of the bulb (let's say it is 120 degrees C). You can turn the light on, and measure the maximum temperature (let's say 200 degrees C). You can then see how quickly the bulb cools down. The result will again indicate that the bulb has been cooling for about ten minutes.
You can do the same kind of measurements with other things. You can see if there are any hot spots on the tiles caused by the heat of my feet as I walked over them. You can measure the hot spot on the tap to see how long ago it was last touched. And all of these things will lead to the same result - that I left the bathroom about ten minutes before you came in.
Now, let's say that there had been a state change seven minutes ago. (Just humour me here, okay?)
Now, we know the rate that the water leaks out in the present state, and the rate of cooling for things like the tiles, the light bulb, the tap, etc. And we know that only part of this cooling/leaking could have occurred in the present state. The rest MUST have happened in the past state.
So we know that what appears to be three minutes of leaking must have happened in the past state, because only seven minutes of leaking could have happened in the present state. Maybe it was longer than three minutes, maybe it was shorter. But whatever length of time it was, it has the same appearance as three minutes of leaking in the present state.
And likewise, we also know that three minutes of lightbulb cooling must have happened in the past state.
But here's the thing...
What if, in the past state, water leaked faster but things cooled slower? If this happened, then we'd see that maybe the leak rate indicated 12 minutes of leaking if we assume a present state only, but the cooling rate of the light bulb would indicate only 8 minutes of cooling. This is contradictory information. So we know that it can't be true.
The only way we could have a different state past that gave results that agreed was if the rate of leaking compared to the rate of cooling was the same in both states, regardless of the rate it actually went at. In other words, if 1 liter of water leaks in the same amount of time as the light bulb cools by ten degrees in the present state, then we'd expect to see that 1 liter of water leaks in the same amount of time as the light bulb cools by ten degrees in the PAST state also. But such a result would be an AMAZING coincidence. It becomes even MORE unlikely when we add in the other methods of finding out how long ago I had left the bathroom.
Likewise, we have many different ways of dating objects, and they all give results that match. This is not the result we'd expect to see if there had been a different state past.
Hey, why not? But since the change affected our solar system at least. Who knows what planets moved in orbits or got shook up, smashed up, or whatever, and maybe some debris came from that sort of thing also. One test we could do to determine if an area was hit by an object of earth origin, is to see if any remnants of life exist! If so it was from earth!
Ah yes, the "sure, why not" method of finding out what really happened. Was Abraham Lincoln a cyborg? Sure, why not!
Needed now? Walt ran some numbers on that, and still found that things could have gotten our of earth area under current physics. Now imagine the possibilities under different laws!!
If water could move vast distances with very little energy, why do we not see signs of this when we look at the oldest rocks? Why do they show water features exactly like the ones we'd expect to see under present state laws? I mean, look at the water features on Mars. How could water from the flood get that far and yet behave exactly like water in the present state when it gets there?
Who is when they use the present state to try and model the past?!
So in other words, make up whatever you need to in order to explain it, and then when it violates all the laws of nature, we just say it was in the different state past. Boy, that lets you say anything you want to support your point, doesn't it?
When you can make up whatever you want, then your position is based on fairytales.
People use different ways to guesstimate. I think the Christian sites allow for more kids born, etc. In any case, the point is that if there was a flood about 4500 years ago, we now have the right population that one expects.
Of course, if the entire human population came from one family, then we'd see a genetic bottleneck. And it just isn't there.
?? Solomon had several hundred wives and concubines. Probably a lot of kids. Jacob had 12 sons. I don't think 2 kids is a great number to assume for ancient times. Australia today...maybe.
Yes, all of them back then had huge families. And all those kids lived to reproducing age.
The point was about "God gave you a brain ..." Yes. Since He gave man a brain, one expects that He would communicate with man.
Then why doesn't he communicate with me? Don't tell me it's because I don't believe. If there is a God, then he knows I seek the truth, whatever it may be.
In the pre flood days, it was direct. He spoke to man. After, He still spoke, but only to a few. Later, He gave us a written word. Example, when God with His own finger wrote laws on a tablet for us.
So why the change?
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