Science supports creationism?

Just a quick guide to terminology:

“Cosmic Evolution” is called “astrophysics” outside Young-Earther circles
“Biological Evolution” is called “evolution” or simply “biology” outside Young-Earther circles
“Abiogenesis” is called “speculation” unless your name is Richard Dawkins or you otherwise write venomous antitheist screeds.

The first two are generally known as “science.” The last, as discussed previously, is not.

I know your comment wasn’t directed at me, but I thought I’d jump in and clarify the nonstandard terminology…

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First. The heat problem was their own admission. They themselves admitted that no known thermodynamic mechanism could have removed that amount of heat quickly enough, so they had to propose extremely complex solutions involving esoteric, bizarre, convoluted new laws of physics that are not supported by any evidence whatsoever. Problems of this level of severity are, quite frankly, a deal-breaker.

Second. Accelerated nuclear decay is an extraordinary claim, the kind that would win a Nobel Prize if it had any merit, not least because it flies in the face of both theoretical considerations and experimental evidence. As such, it needs extraordinary evidence to support it, including studies from multiple independent teams. The only evidence that we have are four disputed studies of uncertain reliability at best from a single team.

This isn’t a biased “evolutionist” response either. There are other examples from mainstream science that suffer from exactly the same problems. One particularly famous example was Fleischmann & Pons’s 1988 announcement of cold nuclear fusion. Other teams were unable to replicate it, and it’s now regarded by the scientific community as erroneous. This level of scrutiny is standard practice in science, and researchers are expected to address objections to their reviewers’ satisfaction, not try to argue their way past them.

Third. Even if these studies could be shown to have some merit, it is never made clear exactly how they are supposed to demonstrate accelerated nuclear decay. It is inferred solely from the fact that they can’t fit the evidence into six thousand years any other way.

Fourth. We need to ask ourselves why would God have gone to the trouble of miraculously accelerating nuclear decay in the first place and putting an extraordinary cooling mechanism in place to remove the heat? The only result of doing so would have been to make the earth look a whole lot older than it actually is. All they’ve managed to do is to propose a convoluted new take on the Omphalos hypothesis.

Fifth. The paper you cite merely shows that one event at Fenton Hill happened more recently than certain other studies suggested. There could be any number of explanations for the discrepancy, and further research may well shed some light on this. However, it places no maximum constraint whatsoever on the overall age of the earth, and fails to account for the numerous other studies elsewhere that place minimum constraints on the age of the earth far, far in excess of six thousand years.

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Let’s see. The list would be geology, biology, and astrophysics mostly. The problem is they make comments that are demonstrably false but I can’t make comment. If I were to do so I would be labeled an atheist. I even tried to gently point out that a set of arguments a member was using was identified as arguments that shouldn’t be used by AIG and ICR and the member quite speaking to me. Still uses those arguments btw. It is stronger than “they simply don’t want to enter into conversations”. It is I would be shown the door just for bringing it up.

YECers are more interested in proselytizing than in discussions of their ideas. They like to use scientific sounding language to support their position, hoping to convince “atheistic” people who accept science that theYEC position is more scientific than mainstream science One claim made frequently by creationist groups is that mainstream scientists no longer really believe in evolution. That statement was almost true 100 years ago, when Mendelian heredity seemed to invalidate the idea that creatures could change other than in very minor ways. in Darwin’s time, it was believed that offspring represented a blending of their parents traits. With one of Darwin’s major assumptions shown to be false, his whole theory seemed to have fallen apart.

Laboratory experiments showed very few variations from a starting population. However, field studies showed that’s wild populations exhibited tremendous variation. These two positions were finally brought together in the modern synthesis of the 1940s.

Creationist groups exploit every misstep of science over the centuries to cast doubt on any scientific conclusion about the world, therefore keeping the Bible just as valid an explanation of how the world came to be as the findings of science.

I hate to think of how much ink has been spilled and how many hours of argument have resulted from people who say they believe in the Bible, but have no idea what it means.

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Perhaps I should have asked you a much more direct question.
The researchers got a conclusive result that showed that there were much more helium atoms present than should have been for a given constant rate of decay and the measured rate of escape from the crystals. Now since the concentration of helium inside the crystals were much higher than outside and the crystals were intact[meaning that helium [or Uranium, Thorium and lead for that matter could not have come from the outside], just what conclusion would YOU have drawn from the research data?

Hi Prode -

A multidomain model is both more consistent with the wide body of helium diffusion in zircons and with the Fenton Hill data. Using this better model results in an age of 1.5 B years for the Fenton Hill zircons. (Technical paper and follow-up)

In addition, any attempt to apply the RATE methodology to other zircon formations yields vastly inaccurate predictions. (link)

Given these detailed rebuttals by highly qualified geologists, I don’t feel I can accept the RATE conclusions on the basis of scientific reasoning.

If I started out convinced that the earth cannot be more than 7000 years old, that atheist scientists cannot be trusted, and that Christians who agree with those scientists are compromisers, then I might accept the RATE conclusions anyway. But I don’t start with that conviction.

Have a good day.

Chris Falter

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Hi Prode,

The first thing I would do would be to seek peer review by independent diffusion chemistry experts, and reproduction of the results by other teams. Without this, we simply can not consider the results to be conclusive. This is standard practice in science.

This is doubly the case for helium diffusion in zircons. Diffusion studies are very complex, both theoretically and practically, and very complex studies mean that there is a lot of scope for error or experimenter bias to creep in. Unrealistic diffusion models, incorrect assumptions about the thermal history of the rocks, and even basic errors such as misidentification of rock samples and arithmetic errors can all drastically affect your interpretation of the results, while experimenter error can affect the results themselves.

As Chris has pointed out, not only have expert peer reviews of the RATE results been uniformly negative, but other teams have obtained results from similar studies that contradict them.

In any case, the conclusion – massively accelerated nuclear decay – is, as I’ve said, an extraordinary one, strongly contradicted by theoretical considerations, multiple other lines of experimental and observational evidence, and the RATE team’s own admission of serious unresolved problems with the idea. You do not introduce radical new laws of physics on the basis of a single set of disputed studies by a single team working with a predefined agenda.

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what about the possibility that ervs actuualy evolved from the genomes?

try 20 my:

http://www.amjbot.org/content/91/4/615.long

I stand corrected. My source for that claim was this blog post by @Joel_Duff – I may have misunderstood it slightly. However, it doesn’t affect his central point: soft tissue and DNA preservation in ancient fossils is very rare—far more so than we would expect if the earth were just 6,000 years old. There is also a correlation between DNA preservation and radiometric dating, which needs to be explained by anyone who believes radiometric results to be invalid.

Try finding a denomination on high side of your chart that takes Biblical sexual morals seriously. For example, uncompromising disapproval of sex outside of marriage. Going a bit farther, I have commented elsewhere in this forum that the LGBTQ agenda does not leave room for a recognizable Biblical sexual ethic. The church closest to my house has no problem with evolution, and is also on the LGBTQ bandwagon. In Denver, the UMC just ordained an openly homosexual female pastor.

For some of us, a figurative dimension to some Old Testament history does not imply elasticity of Biblical ethical commands. We would rather not take our children to a church where this world’s view of sexual morals is advocated–they can pick that philosophy up anywhere.

@Darek_Barefoot, I recommend you read up on the history of sexual morality. It’s not as black and white as you seem to think it is.

The Old Testament made working on the Sabbath a death offence. When you are willing to take the Sabbath laws as seriously as concern over sexual morality, I will be moved to consider the totality of these views.

I find it interesting that you started with sex and ended with much broader ethical commands.

I find the selectivity of literalism fascinating, especially when it is applied to the OT over the NT. Do any of the denominations with stands on sexual morality that are acceptable to you take the words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 25 seriously and literally with respect to legal and illegal immigrants?

John 12:47
“. . . if anyone hears My words and does not believe, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world."

not according to this paper:

, “Biomolecules in fossil remains: Multidisciplinary approach to endurance, The Biochemist”-

the upper limit is about 125000 years in 0c. so there is no correletion between DNA preservation and radiometric dating. at least in this case.

Still doesn’t address my point.

DNA in 4,000-6,000 year old remains is abundant, easy to extract, and fully sequenceable.

DNA in 1 million+ year old remains is rare, difficult to extract, and badly fragmented.

The whole point is that if the earth were only 6,000 years old, we would expect DNA in dinosaur fossils to be very, very common, and in some cases very, very well preserved. But it isn’t.

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An upper limit on survival time means that there is a correlation between preservation and date. In fact, the article you cite assumes throughout that there is a correlation, and that DNA degrades gradually.

Hi Darek,

You have put your finger on a big problem in the American church. The denominations that tend to support a literalistic heremeneutic of Genesis 1- 3 tend to have conservative ethics, and those that tend to support a literal hermeneutic (which in the case of Genesis 1 - 3 means you interpret it figuratively) tend to have liberal ethics. There are plenty of exceptions to the rule, of course.

What is someone who has strong convictions about moral and academic integrity to do if one of those exceptions is not within driving distance? According to @Eddie we could just move across the pond to England, but that’s not realistic for me. My solution is to hang out with a church with a conservative moral ethic, and slap a “What if God created evolution?” bumper sticker on my vehicle.

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Chris - England calling (and it’s not all sweetness and light here, as even Eddie knows!). But it seems to me that the knee-jerk US linkage between non-literal interpretations of bibilcal events and liberal interpretations of biblical ethics (and the antithesis, of course) is a huge problem in American Christianity.

That it is exhibited even on this thread shows that it involves even educated believers - but that many govern their theology along party lines rather than the Rule of Faith. As you say there are exceptions (you and Darek being representative) - maybe their unhappiness with either camp is the best sign of life: the Gospel of Jesus, after all, is an offence to all human systems, and to all party-spirit.

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but this paper support a max 125000 years for a suppose 20 my fossil.

Worth repeating ! A point made weeks ago!