Change and Time in Genesis

I am setting Earth modern surface area as one (1).

Since 2/3rds of the modern surface is young oceans, this leaves 1/3 as continents.

I stand by my math.

1/3*4pi = r^2

therefore the ancient radius of the Earth was (1/12pi)^1/2 as a fraction of its modern radius.

r ( in Noah’s 599th year) ~ 16 % of the modern Earth’s radius. Of course this is an approximate number and would vary considerably over Earth’s long history.

Victor
Please notice that because CEC interpret the world without using Friar Thomas’ metaphysics, we arrive at a radically different Earth history than YEC or OEC.

I am writing a book, but it is unlike any book you have ever read (if I ever finish it). I use the literal text of the Bible (and the physical evidence the Bible itself points to) to show that the Bible will vanquish Western science. The most powerful evidence is in the visible history of how billions of galaxies (at many ranges) formed.

The visible evidence is overwhelming once we eliminate Friar Thomas’ metaphysical assumption that matter is NOT changing itself continually.

Victor

Ok I will accept your math as correct. Now explain how given that would give the earth a radius that is only 58% of the moon’s and therefore a corresponding less value for gravity, how did the earth retain an atmosphere when the moon can’t? It is gravity that gives a planet an atmosphere.

I wish you well in that. You certainly have a lot of elaborate, interconnected ideas, which I think probably are best laid out in book form so any folks who may be so inclined can engage with the whole breadth of your thought.

Peace,
AMW

You can stand by your math – but that means you will remain standing by yourself. I’ll try once more to help bring you into the real world of math.

So let’s accept your premise that the surface area of the smaller earth =1/3. Okay. Then the radius as you say, comes to ~ 0.16. But (and here is where you make your mistake): 16% of what? You say it’s 16% the current radius. But the current radius according to your own premise, Victor, does NOT equal 1. It is the current surface area you set = 1. So you need to back-solve for the current radius as follows:

1 = 4pi*r^2. So our current radius, r, is about 0.282. …which incidentally is square root of 3 times bigger than 0.16.

That means your smaller radius (0.16) is only 0.577 times as big as the current radius, 0.282.

Find a friend who teaches math and have him/her do the math independently if you can’t follow this. They will confirm for you what I am telling you here.

My thought (and I assume Biologos in general) is that Western science is compatable with the Bible, and is not in conflict so long it is not made into the religion of science-ism.
Explain why you feel the Bible should be concerned with vanquishing Western science.

@godsriddle

I know you are an enthusiastic and hopeful fellow… but there are no authentic breccias which contain both dinosaur bones and bones of the largest mammals (whales, elephants, giraffes, rhinos, hippos).

If there were … it would have made world-wide news … because these animals never existed at the same time (let alone at the same time And place).

Consider “Changing Earth Creationism” as “dead in the water”.

Sorry I stand corrected. Lets do real numbers using kilometers
5.1 x 10^8 kilometers squared /4pi = r^2
Assuming the Earth is spherical (it is actually obloid) - then the radius of the Earth should be ~6352 km (close to its accepted radius)

Now if that ancient Earth was a single continent on a smaller globe with a surface area 1/3rd its modern size (modern younger oceans take up ~2/3 the surface area).

5.1 x 10^8 km^2 / 12pi = r^2; r Noah’s days ~3667 km

3667 / 6352 ~ 58% its modern radius. Sorry. I was doing a rush job and I was wrong.

Gravity is not a thing. It is a relationship. Like every other property of matter it shifts relationally as matter ages. Ancient people moved huge megalithic rocks with no cranes. Huge dinosaurs ran on our planet that could not even stand up or stretch their long necks if they were alive today. The way orbits continually accelerate as the atomic clocks also accelerate is what we see in the visible history of how the galaxies grew from naked globs to huge, local growth spirals. In my opinion, gravity is that “force if you like to use that word” that emerges from matter as it changes its clock frequencies.

To reject Friar Thomas’ metaphysics, that matter is NOT changing itself, is to switch to the ancient worldview of the biblical authors, change instead of science. The basis of Western science is the medieval Catholic idea that matter is not changing itself. The Bible states that the creation is enslaved to change (Romans 8:19-22).

Victor

God has a plan to make foolish the wise of this age. He is taking them with their skills. (1 Corinthians 3:18-20). Everything God does is for his ultimate glory. Every person who comes to faith in Him will come based on recognizing that he died for us, unworthy sinners. He alone can convince us to believe. We never come to faith through science. No one will be able to boast in his presence, which is why the wise cannot find him though their wisdom (1 Corinthians 1).

By the way, it is not just science that God has in his sights. It is the world system of the last days (Daniel 2). The Western system was built on the foundations of the four sequential kingdoms listed in Daniel 2.
We got our notion of precision mathematical measuring from the Babylonian priests.

We got our federated multi ethnic, multi religious government ideas from the Persian empire that passed their ideas down to the Greeks and Romans.

We got our philosophical way of mathematical thinking (with ideas such as time) from the Greeks.

We got our structured republics, our legal system, our alphabet and much of our system form the Romans (revived in the Renaissance).

The great image of man will be destroyed and the wind will blow it away. The Western system will be forgotten and people will worship Christ the king who saved the world from wars and self destruction

How could science fail? It was founded on the false idea the Bible predicted for the last days: the notion that all things remain the same. Even their physics operational definitions, even their mathematical laws and especially their stories of beginnings were built on the medieval idea that matter is NOT changing itself as it age. Yet we can see the past to the creation era. Everything is changing, the orbits accelerate along with the atoms.

Victor

While it might be “no thing” it is still what holds the atmosphere to the planet. You are saying the force of gravity was weaker in the past. So what kept our atmosphere attached to the planet?

I always knew you’d finally get a chance to show off those math skills!

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Lets go back to examining the foundational assumption. What foundational assumption? The one the Bible predicted for the last days. What is it? The idea that all things remain the same (panta houtos diamenei in Greek).

Indeed, Western science was contrived on that fundamentalist idea. In modern terms, scientists believe that an atom today is intrinsically the same as it was yesterday. Indeed, the physics definitions depend on this metaphysical idea.

When a scientist measures gravity, mass, time or energy, they use Friar Thomas’ assumption. No one ever detected any of these things as separate entities. We see massive objects, not mass. We see energetic events, not energy. We see slower or faster processes not time. We only see things alter how they move in the vicinity of large objects. The synthetic physics definitions all rely on the medieval Catholic idea upon which Western science was built.

What we see in the universe is relational change. All the properties of matter shift in parallel. The space matter takes increases up as its clock frequencies increase as the orbits accelerate in the opposite direction of the laws of physics. Billions of galaxies grew out from countless clumps of unformed matter God created first. He continues to command the lights in the heavens to become spreading things (noun raqiya) in the grammar of day four.

In the universe we observe with telescopes, the properties of matter (including its inertial property) shift in parallel. Of course a growing Earth (although mentioned four times in the Bible) is not allowed in Friar Thomas’ metaphysics.

The molecules of air in the ancient earth were relationally different from modern atoms. Another example, water is one of the smallest molecules today. It must have been much smaller when all the Earth’s surface water seeped underground into the tehom, back on the first part of day three. In that era, the Earth was a much smaller globe, the Sun was infrared and our planet was surrounded by powdered ice (see Proverbs 8:28).

Change and science are opposite worldviews. The authors of the Bible never wrote in support of science, since the fundamental assumption for science was not invented until more than 1000 years after the final book of the Bible was completed.

Victor

@godsriddle

Let’s list just the amazing ideas in this one little section I highlight:

a) molecule sizes for the same substance changes over time - - not specified whether the particles change size… or just the orbit of electrons.

b) somewhere beneath the Earth’s surface is the Tehom - - but it is not clear whether this is at the very core of the earth where there is molten iron, gold and even uranium … or somewhere between the molten core and the crust.

c) Earth was smaller in diameter back when molecules were smaller.

d) The Sun did not emit light in the visible spectrum - - it was all infrared. The physics necessary for this to be true is not specified.

e) But despite 100% of the Sun’s output being in the infrared spectrum, which is well known for being the primary way that heat is emitted from physical objects in space, the Earth was surrounded by “powdered ice” that resisted the normal tendency of ice becoming liquid water when subjected to heat.

f) While @godsriddle uses Proverbs 8:28 to explain why there is ice in orbit around the earth, he doesn’t seem to take seriously the part of Genesis that describes an ocean of liquid water also in orbit around the Earth … even while having the heat of the sun blocked from the water by the reflective powdered ice. It would seem that the liquid water should be on the outside (radiated by the Sun’s infrared), while the powdered ice is on the inside (shielded from all that heat).

What you are describing is witchcraft on a galactic scale…

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I accept the Bible literally in the worldview of the authors, instead of modern science. What the Bible states is visible. We can see with telescopes how the galaxies formed. It exactly fits the words of day four: directly opposite to scientific theories e.g. the big bang.

For example, we can see how ancient stars shone in infrared and microwave. At many ranges, we observe how the starlight frequencies keep accelerating throughout cosmic history. Matter volume keeps increasing and its inertial properties keep changing as billions of galaxies intrinsically grew from naked globs into huge, local growth spirals.

A few thousand years ago, after the fine ice around the Earth came down, the Egyptians painted the Sun red and the sky tan. The Egyptians and early Sumerians walked around without shirts in the blazing dessert Sun. I wonder why they did not get burned? People did not gradually begin to notice a blue sky until about 2000 years ago. Homer said the sky was bronze.

We observe that galaxies grew from billions of separate point sources that shine in microwave and infrared. God commanded the lights in the heavens to continue to become spreading things (Hebrew noun raqiya) exactly as we observe.

The tehom is defined in the Bible. Jacob used the word when he blessed his sons. Blessing of the tehom that lies beneath. This was water that resided underground. During Noah’s 600th years the fountains of the tehom collapsed.

We can see the evidence that the Earth keeps growing: the Bible says the Earth continues to spread out in unbroken continuity above the waters. Indeed a global expansion seam runs through every ocean, spewing out young molten lava and hot water.

What I am suggesting is that interpreting the Bible with the fundamental assumption of scientists has done damage to the literal account. Only the literal text, interpreted in the changing worldview of the ancients, has support in the geology of our planet, the visible history of galaxies and the thick Neanderthal brows of our ancestors, who lived to watch geological changes according to Job.

Change and science are opposite worldviews. Change is real and visible. It is relational, since the properties of matter keep shifting together, in parallel, throughout cosmic history.

Victor

@godsriddle,

You, my dear sir, are the best argument for why there must be separation between Church and State.

Victor you tend to ignore the questions for which you have no answer so I will break them out for you.

Given all life as we know it depends directly or indirectly on sunlight how do you explain life in a “sub-crustal” sea?

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We have found life deep under the sea, sometimes a kilometer down in the layers under the ocean floor, that has no relationship to the Sun.

Nature article

These are egg laying animals that eat minerals like sulfur. Vast number of bacteria live under the ocean crust that use the heat of the earth and hydrogen, Some of bacteria thrive under the crust in temperatures greater than 400 degrees Celsius. They emerge in black and white smockers teeming with life from deep under the seafloor.

Think about the living things that thrive, kilometers under ice, in the Antarctica lakes that have no connection to the Sun.

We do not see chalk and limestone growing today, so we have no way to replicate the conditions they thrived in. However, but we can examine the geological features of where this stuff formed. this ancient environment is not like our modern seas, It exists only on the continents. iIt is subcrustal, often covered with canted layers of surface rocks. Sometimes we find bits of cert embedded in the chalk, bits of rock that evidently fell from the roof of the cave.

Victor

Yes we do. The coccolithophores responsible for chalk are still found in the ocean today. And they need sunlight. So please explain how coccolithophores grow without sunlight. Appealing to other organisms doesn’t work when the organism under question is still available for study.

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Again, no chalk and limestone are forming today. We see many plankton whose skeletal remains are similar, but we do not know their DNA structure. The coccolithophores today live in sunlight. Similar creatures long ago may have had a different feeding mechanism, since they only lived on the sub-crustal continental seas. Plankton that die today accumulate as marine oozes and clays, not chalk and limestone as they did in the ancient sub-crustal seas.

Let 's talk about assumptions. An ancient person who listened to modern stories about Earth and cosmic history would doubtless call them myths. Moses might wonder, why do those people mythify my words? We have a different worldview, unlike the worldview of the biblical prophets.

  1. We think like philosophers. We adjust all of nature to fit philosophical notions: such as time.

  2. We adjust the Hebrew creation text to fit Latin traditions. Only the literal grammatical words has support in the visible history of how the galaxies formed, not in time but with change.

  3. When we see a modern ocean or the blue sky, we project this onto our theories about creation. Why? Because Western science was founded on the false idea the Bible predicted for the lasts days: that all things remain the same. Peter mentions two areas where the last day people would obfuscate natural history. (A) They reject that the plural heavens came out long age. Yet we can see the history of galaxies. Billions of tiny point-like galactic cores spread out into huge, dusty, local growth spirals. Why do we reject the only history that is visible? Because we are disciples of the medieval Dominican Friar Thomas. We have faith that matter is NOT CONTINUALLY CHANGING itself. Almost everything scientists measure and mathematicate depends on this dogmatic idea that matter is not changing itself continually. Yet we can see the past. the atomic clocks, the space matter takes up and its inertial properties all cahnge together, relationally, in parallel.

(B) We reject the watery history of our planet. For example, we reject a growing Earth although mentioned several times in the Bible. We do this even though none of the modern deep oceans existed in the Early earth. They are all young and, if we remove them, the continents fit together on a minuscule globe. Evidently we are so scientifically minded that we tailor God’s word to fit science.

The Bible plainly states that the creation is enslaved to change, yet the change is orderly and together change (Romans 8:19-22).

All the animals are commanded to change with the passive continuing in unbroken continuity curse. Yet they are not allowed to change into a different kind of animal. God specifically tells us how he changed animals since creation.

Examples. No dessert plants existed in Genesis 2 because water came up out of the ground and watered the entire surface of the earth. It did not rain because all the seas were gathered into one place on the single continent (Day 3). That one place was in the tehom, the sub-crustal seas. Indeed, we find shallow seas existed only on the single continent and the modern abyssal seas had not even begun to spread out yet. According to the Bible, the sub-crustal seas gradually broke up during Noah’s 600th years.

God says he changed all sorts of life since the creation in Job 38 - 40. He claims to change desert donkeys and ostriches. The Early Earth had no deserts. He claims to change mountain goats, yet the Early had had no mountains. He changes fruit eating lions into carnivores. He is the God who manages change. He is not the God who is indifferent to change.

Change and science are fundamentally different worldviews. A scientists can never understand a changing world. An ancient prophet of the Bible could never understand science. they are based on fundamentally opposite assumptions. Science was built on the medieval idea that matter is NOT continually changing. (We can see how the atoms and teh orbits both acclerate throughout cosmic history). The ancients saw changes where modern people imagine time. the tow ways of thinking are not compatible.

This is why I claim that the Bible will defeat Western science. On that day, the pride of man in their science will be abased and the Lord alone will be exalted.

The foolishness of God, the riddle he gives for man to try and decode, is wiser than our wisdom.

Victor

Yes it is. See “The Grand Canyon Monument to an Ancient Earth”, pg 59. BTW, this book costs more than $1.79 but it is well worth the cost. Lots of very nice pictures and sound geology.

Not similar, very similar which would imply largely identical DNA. These are important microfossils and have been widely studied. Or are you going to argue they evolved from an entirely different feeding mechanism (one that works in the dark) to one that requires sunlight while retaining a nearly identical structure. And where is your scripture reference for this?

And why would God speak in riddles that could only be decoded by modern man when he became capable of using science/math/engineering (which are all wrong according to you) to build the telescopes you say are needed to prove your theory? The Bible was written for ancient people and it had meaning to those people. No telescopes needed. You want to overlay a meaning of your own creation on the Word of God and that is not going to work my friend.

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