How Old is the Earth?

[AV1611VET]

Well, if you wanted me to think about it... I did. Whether you agree or not with my conclusion is up to you... but I tried. I can harmonize a universe that's 13.7 billion years old with a universe that was created 6k years ago simply by allowing for retroactive causation.

God created this universe in a series of miracles over a six-day period that raised the level of mass/energy from zero to what it is now.

No science involved.

Even the order of His creation violates all known laws of physics.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

Isn't it deceiving when God creates a false age of the Universe with in the Universe?

Just for clarity, I'm very much a Lover of God. With that hat on, science opens a window into how God creates. And in my way of knowing God, wisdom and creating are two different things.

You're fine with the questions, even the disagreement. We don't have to agree I don't claim to be correct, this isn't a subject of my faith I have much knowledge in nor care to much about really.

I think the deal about the deception goes back to Adam and Eve really. More than any other thing created, God made Adam and Eve as mature human beings. They would have been minutes old, but from outward appearance would have likely been in their 20's. That's an assumption, the Bible doesn't actually say how old they would have appeared, but we do know that Adam was created with enough intelligence to name animals and such, so he would have had to have been in that range.

Fully grown and mature, but only minutes old.

How is it not possible then for God to create the Earth in such a way? And how is He being deceptive by doing so?

 

[AV1611VET]

If lying is not in God's character, then planting evidence that deceives is not in God's character.

Then if nature is so convincing that academia can compare it to the Bible and tell if God is lying or not, why do atheists exist?

If nature speaks so loudly that God couldn't embed oil into His creation for discovery at a later date, why doesn't everyone believe in Him?

 

[AV1611VET]

It's dishonest because God would be creating an illusion of age and history over time that did not actually happen.

Should Adam have had a belly button?

 

[Astrid]

If you can't address science in the science section, then perhaps, you should. Off to some other forum at CF that doesn't discuss the topic you express your repeated loathing for.

Seriously. This obsessive thread hijacking
is beyond tiresome.
Or maybe not, considering all the enablers.

 

[Astrid]

Perhaps, but you're assuming God wouldn't have made it like that. Science is really just man's attempt to explain how God works in and among His creation.

And explain how little of it matches anything in the
Biblical account. For those who are interested to know.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

And explain how little of it matches anything in the
Biblical account. For those who are interested to know.

The Bible isn't an exhaustive scientific document concerned with all the nuances of human science. It's concerned about your soul, and the plan God enacted to redeem your soul. Sorry it's not what you are looking for, but it is what it is. The reason why people will say, "Humans didn't evolve, we were created and came from one man." is because God said so. For God to tell even one lie, He would not be God and thus not worthy of belief. Everything He says is true, and any misconception has nothing to do with Him, but everything to do with our lack of understanding. So again, the Bible isn't going to give you all the answers you seek for why does rock layers contain sediment from 10000 years ago or whatever. That's not the purpose of the Bible.

 

[Astrid]

You're fine with the questions, even the disagreement. We don't have to agree I don't claim to be correct, this isn't a subject of my faith I have much knowledge in nor care to much about really.

I think the deal about the deception goes back to Adam and Eve really. More than any other thing created, God made Adam and Eve as mature human beings. They would have been minutes old, but from outward appearance would have likely been in their 20's. That's an assumption, the Bible doesn't actually say how old they would have appeared, but we do know that Adam was created with enough intelligence to name animals and such, so he would have had to have been in that range.

Fully grown and mature, but only minutes old.

How is it not possible then for God to create the Earth in such a way? And how is He being deceptive by doing so?

I've long observed that creationists have a lot of trouble
with intellectual integrity.
The problem arises from starting with a conclusion
then muddling through trying to match that faith with
actual data.
Last wednesdayism is a good example.


Assuming there is a God and that he would never deceive
goes completely contrary to concocted evidence and tampering with the rest.

The deception is as obvious as if someone were
making Roman coins to artificially age and sell as real.

Just calls for intellectual integrity to see that.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

I've long observed that creationists have a lot of trouble
with intellectual integrity.
The problem arises from starting with a conclusion
then muddling through trying to match that faith with
actual data.
Last wednesdayism is a good example.


Assuming there is a God and that he would never deceive
goes completely contrary to concocted evidence and tampering with the rest.

The deception is as obvious as if someone were
making Roman coins to artificially age and sell as real.

Just calls for intellectual integrity to see that.

Well see that's the problem here though. You (I'm assuming by your response) do not believe in God, and wouldn't accept matters such as this.

Now here's where I'll really spin you around. I don't really care one way or the other. My faith isn't resting on my understanding of creation. Is it possible that God created the universe billions of years ago and in the scriptures used the terminology He did to describe it? Sure, absolutely. I'm willing to accept I'm wrong, because I don't know all the facts about it.

But that's where your error comes in. You don't know all the facts either, it's like looking the keyhole of a door. You can only see a tiny amount of data through the lens given to you, but then you base your entire understanding off of that little bit and base entire schools of thought off of it and present it as absolute truth. When it's not. It might be the truth as you understand it now, but your understanding could change tomorrow and then your entire argument is void. It's constantly changing based off whatever evidence is perceived at the time. All while missing the rest of the picture that's behind the door, what you can't see just through the keyhole.

 

[ViaCrucis]

How is it meant to be deceiving? Perhaps scientific understanding just hasn't fully come to grips with the evidence. For instance, hundreds of years ago, scientists all swore the earth was flat and the center of the universe. Well now science says just the opposite.

Just because your science says something now, doesn't make it right and absolute. What God has created He created, and His understanding and wisdom goes beyond what yours or anyone else's can comprehend.

Let's say a person was created in a lab, a fully formed adult human being using some crazy sci-fi technology. The how isn't important for this analogy. The people who created this person then gave this person a lifetime of memories--memories of being a child, memories of their parents, memories of things they did, times they got in trouble, their first crush, their first kiss, memories of their grandparents dying. They even were designed with scars on their body, from accidents they acquired when they were supposedly younger. Now, of course, they were designed in the lab--they had no parents, no grandparents, never had a crush, a first kiss, and the scars are artificial. So all those memories, both what they remember in their mind as well as the physical memories on their body are all intentionally put there to make this person believe they had a full human life. But they never did. They were created last Thursday in a lab.

Would it be deceptive to make someone believe something is true that isn't true? To give them all the evidence to believe something is true, but it is all faked, meant to present a false reality--would that not be the very definition of deceptive?

Let's translate to God and His creation.

If God has given the material universe memories and scars of things which never happened, but are merely intended to give a false appearance of age, doesn't that mean God is planting false evidence, creating a false reality and presenting it as true when it isn't true.

That would be deceptive. If God created trees fully formed with tree rings that indicate a lifespan of continual tree growth for hundreds or even thousands of years before He created that tree--isn't that deceptive? Wouldn't ice core samples showing seasonal melts and freezes stretching back tens of thousands of years before the universe came into existence--indications of weather patterns and events that never really happened, be deceptive? Impact craters, and the erosion of geological features showing hundreds of thousands or even millions of years of physical events which--in fact--never happened would all be artificial scars. We are, when looking at such things, not seeing a true record of history, but a faked record of history. We are seeing faked evidence.

It's like saying God created the world with fossils already in the rocks, with the remains of dead things which never lived nor died. It's fake, it's deception.

To say God did that is to assault God's character, that God is not truthful, but is a liar.

From a Christian perspective, that is deeply problematic. The idea that the creator of the material universe is, fundamentally, a liar is completely at odds with a biblical and theologically orthodox Christian understanding of God. Because the confession of God as "Maker of all things, seen and unseen" is that God is fundamentally truthful in His creative endeavor; and the biblical pronouncement is that the created order bears truthful witness to God, "The heavens declare the glory of God" writes the Psalmist. The biblical witness, and the entire Christian position on creation as it relates to God and, ultimately, to salvation and eschatology is that God made all things, God made all things good, and that God is faithful to all which He made and, in the end, everything will be made whole and healed in Christ; the sting of death is a curse which causes creation suffering, being subject to futility as St. Paul says in Romans 8. That creation, therefore, is actually groaning in labor pain in a sense of longing for the birth of that new world out of this one, where resurrection and life, not death, reigns.

Even if the witness of the created order may challenge us, we ought to be compelled by the deep claims of our religion--and our Scriptures--that God as the Author of the universe tells the truth. Perhaps this means that we don't always know how to reconcile everything perfectly, or that overly simplistic interpretations of Scripture--and creation--might be demonstrated inadequate. We must still confess a truthful God, a truthful creation, because the chief claim of our religion is the Gospel.

And I think St. Augustine speaks great wisdom when he writes that if we present the Scriptures as being opposed to the plainly obvious things of observable reality, then we are actually insulting the Scriptures and their sacred writers. And if we act as though our Scriptures are untrustworthy about mundane things, then we present them as all the more untrustworthy when they speak of sublime things such as grace, salvation, and eternal life. We are not presenting a defense of Scripture by insisting that the findings and observation of science can't be true "because the Bible says so", we are in fact presenting an assault against the Scriptures. We are not presenting the Scriptures as more credible, but less credible.

When we see that the earth is round, and if we insist, "The Bible says it is flat, so it is flat", that isn't defending the Bible.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Astrid]

The Bible isn't an exhaustive scientific document concerned with all the nuances of human science. It's concerned about your soul, and the plan God enacted to redeem your soul. Sorry it's not what you are looking for, but it is what it is. The reason why people will say, "Humans didn't evolve, we were created and came from one man." is because God said so. For God to tell even one lie, He would not be God and thus not worthy of belief. Everything He says is true, and any misconception has nothing to do with Him, but everything to do with our lack of understanding. So again, the Bible isn't going to give you all the answers you seek for why does rock layers contain sediment from 10000 years ago or whatever. That's not the purpose of the Bible.

" science is really just man's attempt to explain
Gods...creation".

That is only your opinion, stated as fact. So...

I'm aware the Bible isn't echaustive on science.
It doesnt get anything right. Which is OK until
someone claims it did.

It's also your chosen opinion, rather deceptively
stated as fact, that "god" said what you claim, and
that further, the meaning is just as you choose to think.

If evrrything god says is true then some liars got into the bible.
" Flood", for example. Didn't happen.
Whose story is that?


As I said, science show those who care about truth
where the Bible is wrong, if you read it literally.


But you brought up science.


If you are going to run away from science / Bible,
don't make dubious claims in a science debate forum.

 

[partinobodycular]

Even the order of His creation violates all known laws of physics.

If retroactive causation is true then the order is irrelevant... even if completely true. Because every creative act affects what happened before it. If there are no plants, and then you create them, in a retroactively causal reality the entire past will change to reflect this alteration. So you have to look specifically at what God created on the 6th day, which is us. In a retroactively causal reality the act of creating us would've completely changed what God had created on the 5th day, just as what He created on the 5th day would've changed what He'd created on the 4th day.

This isn't to suggest that those other days didn't happen... they did, it's just that they were then superseded by what God created on the next day. It's as if you're watching the mind of God go from creating something very simple, to finally creating us, and each day... each act of creation... brought forth a whole new universe, it didn't simply tweak the last one. Think of each new day as an entirely new beginning.

On the 6th day God created us.

Sorry, but once you get my mind thinking it can be hard to stop it... so it's your fault.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

Let's say a person was created in a lab, a fully formed adult human being using some crazy sci-fi technology. The how isn't important for this analogy. The people who created this person then gave this person a lifetime of memories--memories of being a child, memories of their parents, memories of things they did, times they got in trouble, their first crush, their first kiss, memories of their grandparents dying. They even were designed with scars on their body, from accidents they acquired when they were supposedly younger. Now, of course, they were designed in the lab--they had no parents, no grandparents, never had a crush, a first kiss, and the scars are artificial. So all those memories, both what they remember in their mind as well as the physical memories on their body are all intentionally put there to make this person believe they had a full human life. But they never did. They were created last Thursday in a lab.

Would it be deceptive to make someone believe something is true that isn't true? To give them all the evidence to believe something is true, but it is all faked, meant to present a false reality--would that not be the very definition of deceptive?

Let's translate to God and His creation.

If God has given the material universe memories and scars of things which never happened, but are merely intended to give a false appearance of age, doesn't that mean God is planting false evidence, creating a false reality and presenting it as true when it isn't true.

That would be deceptive. If God created trees fully formed with tree rings that indicate a lifespan of continual tree growth for hundreds or even thousands of years before He created that tree--isn't that deceptive? Wouldn't ice core samples showing seasonal melts and freezes stretching back tens of thousands of years before the universe came into existence--indications of weather patterns and events that never really happened, be deceptive? Impact craters, and the erosion of geological features showing hundreds of thousands or even millions of years of physical events which--in fact--never happened would all be artificial scars. We are, when looking at such things, not seeing a true record of history, but a faked record of history. We are seeing faked evidence.

It's like saying God created the world with fossils already in the rocks, with the remains of dead things which never lived nor died. It's fake, it's deception.

To say God did that is to assault God's character, that God is not truthful, but is a liar.

From a Christian perspective, that is deeply problematic. The idea that the creator of the material universe is, fundamentally, a liar is completely at odds with a biblical and theologically orthodox Christian understanding of God. Because the confession of God as "Maker of all things, seen and unseen" is that God is fundamentally truthful in His creative endeavor; and the biblical pronouncement is that the created order bears truthful witness to God, "The heavens declare the glory of God" writes the Psalmist. The biblical witness, and the entire Christian position on creation as it relates to God and, ultimately, to salvation and eschatology is that God made all things, God made all things good, and that God is faithful to all which He made and, in the end, everything will be made whole and healed in Christ; the sting of death is a curse which causes creation suffering, being subject to futility as St. Paul says in Romans 8. That creation, therefore, is actually groaning in labor pain in a sense of longing for the birth of that new world out of this one, where resurrection and life, not death, reigns.

Even if the witness of the created order may challenge us, we ought to be compelled by the deep claims of our religion--and our Scriptures--that God as the Author of the universe tells the truth. Perhaps this means that we don't always know how to reconcile everything perfectly, or that overly simplistic interpretations of Scripture--and creation--might be demonstrated inadequate. We must still confess a truthful God, a truthful creation, because the chief claim of our religion is the Gospel.

And I think St. Augustine speaks great wisdom when he writes that if we present the Scriptures as being opposed to the plainly obvious things of observable reality, then we are actually insulting the Scriptures and their sacred writers. And if we act as though our Scriptures are untrustworthy about mundane things, then we present them as all the more untrustworthy when they speak of sublime things such as grace, salvation, and eternal life. We are not presenting a defense of Scripture by insisting that the findings and observation of science can't be true "because the Bible says so", we are in fact presenting an assault against the Scriptures. We are not presenting the Scriptures as more credible, but less credible.

When we see that the earth is round, and if we insist, "The Bible says it is flat, so it is flat", that isn't defending the Bible.

-CryptoLutheran

All of this is based off of HUMAN understanding though. Trying to put God in a box made by humans, for humans. Finite beings, with VERY LIMITED knowledge, making claims about things they do not fully understand, based off of a sliver.... a fraction of a sliver of evidence. Humans have not even set foot on Mars yet, and yet we are going to make claims about the foundations of the universe as if what God said is wrong and cannot be trusted.

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
“Who is this who obscures My counsel
by words without knowledge?
Now brace yourself like a man;
I will question you, and you shall inform Me.
Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?
Tell Me, if you have understanding.
Who fixed its measurements? Surely you know!
Or who stretched a measuring line across it?
On what were its foundations set,
or who laid its cornerstone,
while the morning stars sang together
and all the sons of God shouted for joy? Job 38:1-7 (BSB)

 

[Astrid]

Well see that's the problem here though. You (I'm assuming by your response) do not believe in God, and wouldn't accept matters such as this.

Now here's where I'll really spin you around. I don't really care one way or the other. My faith isn't resting on my understanding of creation. Is it possible that God created the universe billions of years ago and in the scriptures used the terminology He did to describe it? Sure, absolutely. I'm willing to accept I'm wrong, because I don't know all the facts about it.

But that's where your error comes in. You don't know all the facts either, it's like looking the keyhole of a door. You can only see a tiny amount of data through the lens given to you, but then you base your entire understanding off of that little bit and base entire schools of thought off of it and present it as absolute truth. When it's not. It might be the truth as you understand it now, but your understanding could change tomorrow and then your entire argument is void. It's constantly changing based off whatever evidence is perceived at the time. All while missing the rest of the picture that's behind the door, what you can't see just through the keyhole.

I see.

So if I look through the keyhole and can only see
part of the mountain of garbage, why, I just dont
know enough and if I get the door open it will
turn out the room is tidy.

Ridiculous.

Part of the integrity I spoke of is not just saying things,
making things up. Which alas is what you keep doing.


Thro a keyhole, tiny? Me? You didn't even peek.


You have zero (0) data that indicates your phony
" entire understanding, entire school of thought,
absolute truth ".

You made it up out of nothing- totally dishonest- and use
it to accuse me of intellectual dishonesty.


It's a highly insulting fantasy- falsehood saying I, who tend to think in a more or
less scientific framework, would ever claim " truth" or any
" absolutes".

That is the province of religionists. Not me. Not science.

I'm a bit curious how you feel.righteous in such squalid
behaviour.

 

[BurningBush84]

Between 6 and 10 k years. YouTube channel called Answers in Genesis convinced me.

 

[Astrid]

All of this is based off of HUMAN understanding though. Trying to put God in a box made by humans, for humans. Finite beings, with VERY LIMITED knowledge, making claims about things they do not fully understand, based off of a sliver.... a fraction of a sliver of evidence. Humans have not even set foot on Mars yet, and yet we are going to make claims about the foundations of the universe as if what God said is wrong and cannot be trusted.

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
“Who is this who obscures My counsel
by words without knowledge?
Now brace yourself like a man;
I will question you, and you shall inform Me.
Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?
Tell Me, if you have understanding.
Who fixed its measurements? Surely you know!
Or who stretched a measuring line across it?
On what were its foundations set,
or who laid its cornerstone,
while the morning stars sang together
and all the sons of God shouted for joy? Job 38:1-7 (BSB)

And your human understanding of a book,written
by humans ? No probs there?

 

[ByTheSpirit]

" science is really just man's attempt to explain
Gods...creation".

That is only your opinion, stated as fact. So...

I'm aware the Bible isn't echaustive on science.
It doesnt get anything right. Which is OK until
someone claims it did.

It's also your chosen opinion, rather deceptively
stated as fact, that "god" said what you claim, and
that further, the meaning is just as you choose to think.

If evrrything god says is true then some liars got into the bible.
" Flood", for example. Didn't happen.
Whose story is that?


As I said, science show those who care about truth
where the Bible is wrong, if you read it literally.


But you brought up science.


If you are going to run away from science / Bible,
don't make dubious claims in a science debate forum.

So what evidence do you have the flood didn't happen? Multiple civilizations from all over the planet have stories of a great flood happening. Clearly at some point in human past a great flood happened. How else do we explain civilizations having similar stories? They couldn't jump on social media and share it instantly. Multiple would not have enough had knowledge of the other civilizations, yet they have similar stories. Now that's not scientific evidence, but saying the flood didn't happen needs some evidence for such a claim. And there is some evidence that it did, even outside of the Bible.

I'm not running away from science, I'm merely saying that science is ever evolving, because it's based off of human wisdom which is woefully inadequate in such matters. No human was around when these events happened. Scientists base their conclusions off whatever evidence they accept at the time. That's another matter that needs to be explored, what evidence is accepted and what evidence is rejected. Let's not pretend humans don't have agendas and ignore things that don't fit their understanding and beliefs.

Ah, but there it is. Belief.

A person's beliefs will likely shape their understanding on subjects such as this.

 

[ByTheSpirit]

And your human understanding of a book,written
by humans ? No probs there?

Forgot inspired by God

 

[Astrid]

Between 6 and 10 k years. YouTube channel called Answers in Genesis convinced me.

AIG is a bunch of lying phonies out to
exploit honest and earnest Christians.

 

[dlamberth]

Then if nature is so convincing that academia can compare it to the Bible and tell if God is lying or not, why do atheists exist?

Because diversity is built into the very nature of life.