The problem of the Green River Formation

[Job 33:6]

I used to be a YEC but then I followed Ken Ham's reasoning that if you can't trust Genesis, how can you be sure about the rest? So then I became an atheist. Now I'm an agnostic.

I actually was in a similar boat. I was really offended by young earth creationists like Ken Ham. But only after I studied and became a geologist and became aware of how ridiculous young earth creation is. It was certainly a difficult pill to swallow, when I realized that...well, I felt lied to.

I entered the whole gray area between atheism and agnosticism for a handfull of years. Then in some round about way found myself back at church every sunday, just with a new perspective. An old earth, theistic evolution perspective.

Ken Ham and Answers in Genesis, really do hurt the church. Because there are many who walk the same path, but never actually return to the church. But if we just had things right the first time, people would not feel betrayed by the church.

 

[Job 33:6]

Here is a cross section of strata, including the green river formation.

Whats interesting here is that, we have offset of strata spanning from the precambrian through the middle cretaceous in the two most western faults. But these faults do not cross cut younger formations from the late cretaceous and throughout the cenozoic.

So really, what this tells us is that the mid cretaceous layers were deposited, lithified, then faulted. Then later after this offset, late cretaceous strata and beyond was deposited, post lithification and faulting of the prior strata. Then the largest fault extends up into the tertiary.

So, the green river formation and everything it encompasses, is really only a single piece of a much larger set of formations that each have their own independent qualities. Young earthers are challenged in explaining existence of a single formation. By the time we throw in complexities and details of all of the other formations, there is just no contest. Not by a long shot.

Because really, we could look, superpositionally at any other period of time (the other 99% of the earth), pre-dating the green river formation, and we could easily find overturned angular unconformities, complex fracture systems, trace fossils and fossils of all types (burrows, nests, tracks etc.), cataclastic deformation, sheared bilaterally symmetric fossils, ophiolites and really countless features that require time to form. Far more time than 10,000 years, but rather, millions of years.

Even if they could somehow settle their dispute (which they cant), they would still be faced with a practically infinite number of challenges beyond the green river formation.

 

[juvenissun]

Normally 10,000 years is the upper limit

OK. If so, you can not use the known sciences (include geology) to reason the YEC.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

A major reason I stopped being a young-earth creationist is because it seemed that the Green River formation looked liked it was millions of years old - at least not a few thousand years old.

Creationists disagree about whether it formed during or after the flood:

Difficulties with a Flood model for the Green River Formation
"...the data clearly indicate the GRF was deposited within lakes, after the Flood"

Answers in Genesis - Green River Formation Very Likely Did Not Form in a Postdiluvial Lake

An article about the GRF by an old-earth creationist:
Creationist Misuse of the Green River Formation

For YECs: do you think it was formed during the flood or after?

All their same arguments were used against Harlen Bretz and were all wrong then too....

J Harlen Bretz - Wikipedia

"Bretz published a paper in 1923, arguing that the channeled scablands in Eastern Washington were caused by massive flooding in the distant past. This was seen as arguing for a catastrophic explanation of the geology, against the prevailing view of uniformitarianism, and Bretz's views were initially discredited. However, as the nature of the Ice Age was better understood, Bretz's original research was vindicated, and by the 1950s his conclusions were also vindicated....."

"....Bretz encountered resistance to his theories from the geology establishment of the day. The geology establishment was resistant to such a sweeping theory for the origin of a broad landscape for a variety of reasons, including lack of familiarity with the remote areas of the interior Pacific Northwest where the research was based, and the lack of status and reputation of Bretz in the eyes of the largely Ivy League-based geology elites. Furthermore, his theory implied the potential possibilities of a Biblical flood, which the scientific community strongly rejected."

The Green River formation was formed after, just as was the Grand Canyon.....

 

[GlabrousDory4]

Let assume the Green River Formation was a lake facies. How would this contradict to the Flood model? It could be deposited anytime in relative to the Flood, couldn't it?

Any time in the 10 or so million years it represents before the Noachian Flood, sure. A lot of Flood advocates, though, are also not big fans of "deep time", so it might throw a monkey wrench into that, but in and of itself if we accept that the earth had been around millions (if not billions) of years before Noah's flood (which happened when HUMANS were around, so relatively recently), then it shouldn't cause any issue I wouldn't think. (I mean apart from itself leaving no evidence, no great die-off marked in the recent geological record as would be required of the Noachian Flood, and leaving no stratigraphic evidence for its existence either.)

 

[GlabrousDory4]

OK. If so, you can not use the known sciences (include geology) to reason the YEC.

This is very true. Actual science (and not just geology) cannot be used if one is adovcating a Young Earth. It would require that pretty much every single science we DO use every day is wrong despite working. Chemistry, physics, etc. They must all be thrown out when discussing Young Earth.

 

[GlabrousDory4]

But if 20 million years is given, could it still be called a young earth?

This is a quantized concept. Old Earth would have zero reason to be arbitrarily limited to only 20 million years. The data does not support that and the only reason to hold to a >10,000 year old earth would be science and science indicates that 20 million is too short.

Young earth (< 10,000 years) is based on religious dogma and not science and it is predicated on the Biblical timeline which would not allow for 20 million years (unless one wants to arbitrarily put millions of years in the bible without any Biblical support for that).

So it's not really like you can have a sliding scale of ever longer terms. You either have an earth that is billions of years old (data and science) or < 10,000 years old (Bible).

 

[juvenissun]

This is a quantized concept. Old Earth would have zero reason to be arbitrarily limited to only 20 million years. The data does not support that and the only reason to hold to a >10,000 year old earth would be science and science indicates that 20 million is too short.

Young earth (< 10,000 years) is based on religious dogma and not science and it is predicated on the Biblical timeline which would not allow for 20 million years (unless one wants to arbitrarily put millions of years in the bible without any Biblical support for that).

So it's not really like you can have a sliding scale of ever longer terms. You either have an earth that is billions of years old (data and science) or < 10,000 years old (Bible).

An "old" earth is defined by 4.5±0.3 b.y. age. Any approximation less than that is NOT an age in the concept of an old earth.

 

[juvenissun]

This is very true. Actual science (and not just geology) cannot be used if one is adovcating a Young Earth. It would require that pretty much every single science we DO use every day is wrong despite working. Chemistry, physics, etc. They must all be thrown out when discussing Young Earth.

However, the current theoretical sciences would be very very helpful to understand the "science" of Flood. An example of the theoretical science is something like the "dark energy", or the "multiple universe".

 

[juvenissun]

Any time in the 10 or so million years it represents before the Noachian Flood, sure. A lot of Flood advocates, though, are also not big fans of "deep time", so it might throw a monkey wrench into that, but in and of itself if we accept that the earth had been around millions (if not billions) of years before Noah's flood (which happened when HUMANS were around, so relatively recently), then it shouldn't cause any issue I wouldn't think. (I mean apart from itself leaving no evidence, no great die-off marked in the recent geological record as would be required of the Noachian Flood, and leaving no stratigraphic evidence for its existence either.)

The fact that Bible put Noah and the Flood together at the same time is telling us that our current science is not good enough to understand the whole thing. We can only reason individual pieces of the story.

 

[GlabrousDory4]

The fact that Bible put Noah and the Flood together at the same time is telling us that our current science is not good enough to understand the whole thing. We can only reason individual pieces of the story.

Until reason disagrees with the Bible at which point we must toss out reason.

 

[GlabrousDory4]

However, the current theoretical sciences would be very very helpful to understand the "science" of Flood. An example of the theoretical science is something like the "dark energy", or the "multiple universe".

So the stuff we only hypothesize exists is better than the more standard science we use every single day effectively? It's better to toss out the chemistry and physics we've been using for hundreds of years quite effectively because they disagree with Genesis' Creation account but we can DEFINITELY count on stuff that is only hypothetical?

Hmmmm.

 

[JackRT]

So the stuff we only hypothesize exists is better than the more standard science we use every single day effectively? It's better to toss out the chemistry and physics we've been using for hundreds of years quite effectively because they disagree with Genesis' Creation account but we can DEFINITELY count on stuff that is only hypothetical?

Hmmmm.

Hmmmm, indeed.

 

[juvenissun]

Until reason disagrees with the Bible at which point we must toss out reason.

It would not happen. They ALWAYS agree.

 

[juvenissun]

So the stuff we only hypothesize exists is better than the more standard science we use every single day effectively? It's better to toss out the chemistry and physics we've been using for hundreds of years quite effectively because they disagree with Genesis' Creation account but we can DEFINITELY count on stuff that is only hypothetical?

Hmmmm.

Do you even know why do theoretical sciences exist and are extremely valuable?

Evolution is a theoretical science. Unfortunately it is a low quality one.

 

[juvenissun]

So the stuff we only hypothesize exists is better than the more standard science we use every single day effectively? It's better to toss out the chemistry and physics we've been using for hundreds of years quite effectively because they disagree with Genesis' Creation account but we can DEFINITELY count on stuff that is only hypothetical?

Hmmmm.

Show me ONE verse in the Bible which does not fit the current understanding of physics or chemistry.

This is a serious challenge to you. Otherwise, take your words back.

 

[pitabread]

Evolution is a theoretical science. Unfortunately it is a low quality one.

What's your measure of "quality"?

 

[46AND2]

Show me ONE verse in the Bible which does not fit the current understanding of physics or chemistry.

This is a serious challenge to you. Otherwise, take your words back.

A seriously easy challenge. How about any verse that describes a miracle...

 

[JackRT]

Show me ONE verse in the Bible which does not fit the current understanding of physics or chemistry.

This is a serious challenge to you. Otherwise, take your words back.

Genesis 30:37 Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches. 38 Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink, 39 they mated in front of the branches. And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted. 40 Jacob set apart the young of the flock by themselves, but made the rest face the streaked and dark-colored animals that belonged to Laban. Thus he made separate flocks for himself and did not put them with Laban’s animals. 41 Whenever the stronger females were in heat, Jacob would place the branches in the troughs in front of the animals so they would mate near the branches, 42 but if the animals were weak, he would not place them there. So the weak animals went to Laban and the strong ones to Jacob. 43 In this way the man grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and female and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

 

[Tinker Grey]

Genesis 30:37 Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches. 38 Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink, 39 they mated in front of the branches. And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted. 40 Jacob set apart the young of the flock by themselves, but made the rest face the streaked and dark-colored animals that belonged to Laban. Thus he made separate flocks for himself and did not put them with Laban’s animals. 41 Whenever the stronger females were in heat, Jacob would place the branches in the troughs in front of the animals so they would mate near the branches, 42 but if the animals were weak, he would not place them there. So the weak animals went to Laban and the strong ones to Jacob. 43 In this way the man grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and female and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

You fail. He said ONE verse.