Do you believe in a literal 7 day creation?

If this book is God's word...2 peter 1:19-21, John 1:1-2

and God cannot lie

why the question

if he can lie we believe in vain since He did not pay the price for are sins

GodAtWorkToday said:

so now what does AiG say, just to get some balance and came across this article talking about a new creationist cosmology that is unsettling the big bangers.
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/405.asp

There is further comment from the theory's author located at;
http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-338.htm

These articles actually make a lot of sense. Interestingly they are not too far from the links that Vance sent on geocentricity. While Humphreys is not suggesting the earth is the centre of our solar system, he is saying it is close to the centre of the universe in his theory.

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Here is Talk Origins' response to Humphrey's model

Talk Origins

d) Russell Humphreys' Starlight and Time

In 2000, Dr. Russell Humphreys published his book Starlight and Time. In it, he proposed an alternative to the Big Bang theory: he claimed that if one uses General Relativity, but assumes (in contrast to the standard Big Bang theory) that the universe has a center and a boundary, one can construct a model in which the time at this center runs much slower than in the outer regions. There has been much debate on this, and even other creationists have pointed out that there are errors in his model (see for example the comment "This criticism has led the editorial staff of the ICC to conclude that there was a failure in the peer review process of Humphreys' 1994 paper [29] in which he first publicly presented his model." in The current state of creation astronomy). Nevertheless, the major creationist organizations Answers in Genesis and Institute for Creation Research still favor it (see How can we see distant stars in a young universe? and The current state of creation astronomy). The Old Earth Creationist (OEC) organization Reasons to Believe published the following rebuttal to Humphreys' model, including his later changes in the model (which, as far as I know, didn't lead to the publication of a new, updated book).

A longer, quite technical comment (also from an OEC) is Starlight and Time is the Big Bang. It contains lots of valuable arguments against Humphreys' model.

Here is yet another rather technical rebuttal: Error's in Humphreys' cosmological model, which includes a reply by Humphreys.

More criticisms of Humphreys' model, and his replies thereto, can be found at Russell Humphreys answers Various Critics.

Also interesting is Tim Thompson's comment in the talk.origins feedback from April 2003.

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Tenacious-D said:

Please, not Humphrey's cosmological model. It's tripe, the problem is explaining it is tripe to people with no GR background.

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That claim requires support.

In 1996 they tried an extensive letter campaign to Christian leaders. In 1997 they switched to a creationist scientific journal.9 Thankfully, my answers have satisfied reviewers and silenced critics. The resulting four-years debate have now been archived on the Internet.10 The debate apparently ended last year after I emphasized that the Rossites had refused to comment on several key concepts and quotes from the secular astrophysics literature which support my cosmology. Their silence betrays the weakness of their arguments.

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and

6 October 2003

The prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has published a revolutionary paper1 which (probably unwittingly) gives powerful support to the basic principles of Dr Russell Humphreys’ creationist cosmology.

Humphreys’ proposal, which sought to solve the ‘light-travel-time’ problem, is set out in the popular-level (with technical appendix) book Starlight and Time2. Because it starts with different assumptions from the standard ‘big bang’ notion, applying the same mathematical ‘machinery’ provides startlingly different conclusions. Now the establishment seems prepared to consider that the foundational beliefs of big bang thinking may be radically wrong.

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Full details can be seen here;
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/1006cosmology.asp

GodAtWorkToday said:

That claim requires support.


and


Full details can be seen here;
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/1006cosmology.asp

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OK then, could you define for me what exactly an event horizon is and how you determine this from the metric coefficients, if that is possible? Why does Humphrey's get this wrong in his 'paper'?

Can you tell me why Humphreys uses a Schwarzchild like coordinate time instead of a global comoving time that is not based on a bad coordinate system that he uses?

Can you tell me why he uses a time coordinate that inside the Schwarschild radius (r=2M) is spacelike, yet he uses this coordinate to give values for elapsed times when it is not even timelike?

The above are elementary errors of GR that anyone who actually knows what they are doing does not make, period.

Can you tell me why predictions of his model with respect to redshift distributions are not seen in observation?

I'll tell you why, because his model predicts unphysical results that cannot be observed since his analysis is just plain wrong.

Do you know why the paper they call 'support' for his model really has absolutely nothing to do with his model?

The problem with attempts such as Humphreys is that they bamboozle the faithful with use of big words and esoteric concepts and since they want so hard to believe attacks on standard science they blindly believe some hack like Humphreys as put one over on the science community since he is a man of God so to speak. In reality, this material receives no credit from the science community because it isn't science. It is a poor attempt at theory by a person not versed in general relativity or cosmology and is seen for such on a cursory analysis.

Please see my thread entitled the problem with Creation Science to know why Creationist sources are simply not reliable.

GodAtWorkToday said:

Beyond that scientists, then use colour/brightness comparisions which is by far a lot more subjective, and based upon assumptive conclusions.

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It may be so simplistic that it gets overlooked in technical details, but we do have younger readers and people with very little science education who may need this clarified.

In scientific work, colour and brightness, are not estimated by eye-balling a star and saying "Well that one looks red and dull while the one over there looks blue and bright."

Colour is determined by measuring the frequency of the wave-length and brightness likewise by mathematical measurement. So the measurements are not subjective, though they may not be as exact as parallax measurements of distance.

Vance said:

Please see my thread entitled the problem with Creation Science to know why Creationist sources are simply not reliable.

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Hi Vance,
The only problem with that, is that if you go to Evolutionary sources, you have no guarantee of 'good' science. All you get is science based upon different assumptions. Also most of those sites will only publish science that furthers their cause of promoting evolution.

It may be a good source to find out what evolutionists believe, but it is not where I would want to get my science 'facts' from.

From my reading from both TO and AiG, I would not say that I see better science on either one of them. I do note that AiG seems more open about their theories being theories, and still open to review.

I think the evolutionists in this thread write off AiG articles as bad science simply because they dis-agree with the evolutionist position. From what I have seen in both sources is that you will find assumptions buried in the science of both camps, and if any of these assumptions is wrong, then so too is the conclusions.

The bottom line of it all, is that as a Bible believing Christian (is there any other kind?), it is still more secure to let Scripture interpret Scripture, and not try to allow man's 'knowledge' to carry a higher authority than Scripture. Especially when it is built upon a very assumptive process.'

If it were not for the need of evolution to have a very old earth, and the big-bang theory to have a 15 billion year universe, whould any of you still seek to interpret Gen 1-2 non-literally. I doubt it.

But because we have grown up in an era of evolution as fact propaganda, and a huge very old universe, it seems more comfortable and necessary to treat Gen 1-2 differently than the rest of Scripture. This does mean that your knowledge is being used to validate Scripture, which then means that your knowledge is held in higher regard than the authority of Scripture. I would suggest that is a foolish place to be.

GodAtWorkToday said:

From my reading from both TO and AiG, I would not say that I see better science on either one of them. I do note that AiG seems more open about their theories being theories, and still open to review.

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That is like reading Time Magazine and the National Enquirer and saying that one is not better news than the other and that the National Enquirer seems to be more open about their news being not 100% confirmed.

What Gold Dragon said, but a bit more.

This is a rare occasion where I can honestly say you simply have it all wrong. :0)

1. You say that the two sources are starting with a different set of assumptions. That is actually true. Science (and TO is a fairly good representative of scientific thought) starts with the assumption that we should let the evidence we gather and observe determine what conclusions we reach. AiG starts with the assumption (and they fully acknowledge this) that their interpretation of Genesis (literal six 24-hour period of creation about 6,000 years ago) is the correct one and that they WILL reject any conclusion which contradicts this. Period. So, rather than just observing the evidence and seeing where it leads, they go in search of evidence, however strained, to support their presupposition. They then will develop theories NOT which best explain the evidence that they can gather and observe, but instead which best explain their preconceived ideas about what MUST be true.

Now, tell me, which is the process more likely to lead to an accurate explanation of anything?

And, no, science is not less open about their theories being theories and their facts being facts. They just have better theories and more facts and so speak about them with more confidence. If I was presenting the concepts that Creationists present, I too would be VERY up-front about their speculative nature! The important point is that AiG and ICR and others are LESS open to their underlying presumptions being incorrect, since nothing is less open than "we can't be wrong".

So, yes, TO does indeed present much better science than AiG, which is at best a psuedo-science since they break the first rule of science by starting with a hard and fast underlying necessity from which they will not budge. This is theology, not science.

2. Scientists do not write off Creationist concepts because they disagree with the evolution position. To the extent they raise legitimate questions, they treat them as such and address them. But most of what AiG proposes is bad science because they are straining to support a pressuposition and, thus, are willing to entertain a LOT of questionable (a charitable characterization) material. True, not at all the level of nonsense that someone like Hovind presents. But their biggest failing is their reluctance to let go of a pet theory when it has been proven incorrect. I will have to track down my "progression of YEC'ism" which shows how Creationists have consistently had to concede their incorrect science, but dig in their heels for a long time before doing so.

And always keep in mind that science is a HIGHLY competitive field which encourages and rewards succesful de-bunking of accepted theories and concepts. Any new theory or idea and explanation of evidence is sent through a pounding gauntlet of peer review and most never make it out the other side. But any thoery or concept that IS sound will eventually be embraced even if it does upset the apple-cart, in fact especially if it DOES upset the apple-cart. I can assure you that a scientist who could convincingly show that the theory of evolution was fatally flawed (not just was needed refining, but was completely falsified) would become immensely famous and wealthy and would win the Nobel Prize. This really is true, it would be very exciting for the scientific community. They love that kind of stuff and people have thus been trying to falisify evolution for 150 years. No one has done this yet.

3. Yes, I would, and did read Genesis non-historically before I knew much at all about evolution and while I was still a YEC. And you keep ignoring the simple historical fact that many, many Christians have read it that way from the beginning of Christianity and even before with the Jews. You can not argue at all that they adopted a non-historical view of Genesis 1 and 2 in order to support evolution and an old earth, since they knew nothing of either. They read it this way for the simple reason that it seemed what the author intended.

4. No, we do not treat Genesis differently than the rest of Scripture. We treat it exactly the same, which is to take each section of Scripture on its own terms. That which makes more sense to be read as literal history is read that way. That which makes more sense when read as some form of non-historical style, is read that way. We (and I assume, you) do not read Chronicles, Job, Psalms, Revelation and Song of Solomon the same way at all. Each has their own intricacies and levels of historicity and non-historicity, as well as degrees of symbolism, poetry and figurative language thrown into the mix. Genesis 1 and 2 are treated with the same respect: a determination of what God intended us to get from that passage.

YEC's, on the other hand, simply presume that the literal-historical reading which has been prevalent for the last few hundred years must be the way it was meant to be read and never look any further.

Tenacious-D said:

OK then, could you define for me what exactly an event horizon is and how you determine this from the metric coefficients, if that is possible? Why does Humphrey's get this wrong in his 'paper'?

Can you tell me why Humphreys uses a Schwarzchild like coordinate time instead of a global comoving time that is not based on a bad coordinate system that he uses?

Can you tell me why he uses a time coordinate that inside the Schwarschild radius (r=2M) is spacelike, yet he uses this coordinate to give values for elapsed times when it is not even timelike?

The above are elementary errors of GR that anyone who actually knows what they are doing does not make, period.

Can you tell me why predictions of his model with respect to redshift distributions are not seen in observation?

I'll tell you why, because his model predicts unphysical results that cannot be observed since his analysis is just plain wrong.

Do you know why the paper they call 'support' for his model really has absolutely nothing to do with his model?

The problem with attempts such as Humphreys is that they bamboozle the faithful with use of big words and esoteric concepts and since they want so hard to believe attacks on standard science they blindly believe some hack like Humphreys as put one over on the science community since he is a man of God so to speak. In reality, this material receives no credit from the science community because it isn't science. It is a poor attempt at theory by a person not versed in general relativity or cosmology and is seen for such on a cursory analysis.

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Isn't it funny, you ask for more support after I warned you that explaining why Humphreys model is nonsense requires a knowledge of GR. I then provide some questions to you so that you could show how your knowledge of GR lends you to believe his model.

Yet you obviously have ignored my questions. Could it be because as almost every Creationist does, they accept anythig and everything if it bolsters their preconditioned mindset no matter how physically bizarre and that they have absolutely zero knowledge of the topic at hand.

In other words, you haven't a clue about Humphreys model or GR in general and are just cutting and pasting material that might as well be written in Sanskrit as far as you are concerned.

I must say, that is Creationist par for the course.