The Lies of AiG

So you say.

People can take my word for it, or take your word for it. Thankfully none of the evidence is secret and it doesn’t take much research to educate yourself and find out who knows what they are talking about and who is parroting propaganda that was old and outdated even thirty years ago. But you have to get off the creationist websites that are lying and misrepresenting the reality of the situation. I’m not going to bother spoon-feeding you good information, because I believe it would be a waste of time. But lots of people who are honestly seeking the truth on these matters manage to find it pretty readily available.

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Here’s one account. Denis Lamoureux, with PhDs in theology and biology, has written extensively on this, too @DOL

Understand this is not to criticize the Bible. John Walton also has terrific writings that convince us to take the Bible as it was written, not as we in the 21st century accidentally misread it.
It takes someone who is familiar with the Ancient Near East and science; to understand what the Hebrews meant.
thanks. Blessings.

How should we interpret the Genesis flood account? - Common-questions - BioLogos

And most of my family and friends are YEC, and that doesn’t prevent their being very wonderful Christians that teach me much more about being good, faithful followers of Christ than I know. We can learn from each other; and the godliness I value much more than the science. Thanks.

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Fortunately, I am not the first or the brightest to try and answer this.

Note: a cubit is the length from a man’s elbow to outstretched finger. The Hebrew cubit was about 18", the Egyptian, about 21". If Noah were taller, it could have even been longer. The following uses the 18" cubit.

The volume of the ark would be 450 feet long by 75 feet wide by 45 feet high. This equals 1,518,750 cubic feet and is comparable to 569 modern railroad boxcars.

The total number of boxcars used would be 318 with the total number of animals at 145,400. There would be 251 boxcars left over. That means that only 56% of the ark would be used for storing the animals. Obviously, then, the rest of the space would be used for food for the people and animals and sleeping quarters. In addition, considering that insects are extremely small, it is easily conceivable that they could be housed in part of the remaining space.

https://carm.org/about-the-bible/could-noahs-ark-hold-all-the-animals/

And lots of people tend to believe what they want; even a theory with as many holes as evolution. How much do you know about tests on bacteria and fruit flies the past 100 years trying to prove evolution?

Patrick, none of your drive bys are going to make me change my mind. I was YEC. Then I did thousands of pages of reading. I know who has the more convincing evidence and more compelling biblical interpretation. I’ve already done my homework and the fact that you have some creationist links does not feel threatening to me at all. I am completely confident that evolution is a solid scientific theory supported my mountains of evidence.

From this link:

The Genesis account is one of many stories of catastrophic floods in the ancient world, including the Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh, which bears striking similarities to the story of the Flood.

This doesn’t mean that Genesis 6-9 is borrowed from the stories of other cultures, but that it is based on a common cultural memory of a watery cataclysm.

I agree here, and go further, saying the flood is common to most cultures, not just many. (A short search says 270-600 cultures) How could that be a local event, unless all cultures came from one small area less than 4500 years ago? Remember Babel? Once you begin turning the bible into myths, it all ends up myths.

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Doesn’t apply. We are talking about a global flood that left deposits 1,000’s of feet deep.

The world has been covered with water for a year. Where do the seeds come from? After a fire plants move in from outside the fire area. There is no outside when the flood covers the entire earth.

After a year in the water there wouldn’t be any carrion left.

Large carnivores would decimate any population of small animals before they had a chance to grow. They are all localized in one area around the ark remember.

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I don’t think you would classify the NT as the same as the OT style or meaning or addressed population; you would agree that the culture was much different.

Two recent examples of miscommunication between cultures:

We are sinking! (with English subtitles) - YouTube

Freckle - King Price - Kettle - YouTube

There is nothing more adamant than an ex. Like ex-smokers. Evolution either is or isn’t. So how does it get so emotional for some people? Dogma.

https://www.newgeology.us/presentation32.html

As a matter of fact, many leading evolutionists have recognized the essentially “religious” character of evolutionism. Even though they themselves believe evolution to be true, they acknowledge the fact that they believe it! “Science”, however, is not supposed to be something one “believes”. Science is knowledge—that which can be demonstrated and observed and repeated. Evolution cannot be proved, or even tested; it can only be believed.

Again. How do you determine how many animals?

The math does not add up to anything legitimate either. It’s literally just made up numbers not based on anything scientific. Not to mention all the other areas of contention I brought up.

It’s not dogma and no one is getting emotional. What it is is frustrating to see something so dishonest and unintelligent trying to be passed off as a intellectual understanding of science.

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Lots of smokers were crazy adamant about their right to keep smoking, too, at least ‘back in the day’. (I’m an old guy, and an ex-YEC, too. :grin:) You are free to remain a mistaken YEC, as well.

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I don’t understand why people always say when you start taking parts of the Bible as myths you start to turn it all into myths. That’s just simply not true.

When reading the Bible, it’s not the fantastical nature of the story that dictates if it’s literal or mythological. There is nothing more fantastical in the Bible than the dead coming back to life. Yet most of us here believe in the resurrection. Though I’m a cessationist I believe that miracles existed in the past including healing the sick instantly, speaking in unknown tongues, and being able to rebuke and cast away supernatural entities. Yet believing in these crazy stories as being true, I still reject a literal interpretation of genesis 1-11.

The reason why I reject a literal interpretation has nothing to do with science. It has purely to do with contextual analysis. Biblical hermeneutics. Interpreting scripture.

Because I’m able to get an accurate understanding of early genesis it allows me to see how science can work with it. Science does not dictate how I read the Bible. How I read the Bible allows me to harmonize science with it.

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True. The people of the OT were very different than people like us today, who grew up in a society built on the Greek way of thinking. Even those Jews in the NT fought conformance.

Brad Scott taught much about these mindsets. He passed away in July, 2020.
https://www.wildbranch.org/teachings/hebrew-greek-mind/

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Playing off of the writing styles showcased by different cultures we can also do something similar within the Torah and just the Jewish culture.

When we get the time scale of genesis 1-11, where else do we find a similar story line throughout the rest of the Torah? What other book picks up on first time characters and span thousands of years?

What other books routinely bring up creation again and again? Job and chapters like psalms
74. Both parts of the Bible wrote in a very different way.

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Taken literally, the first 11 chapters of Genesis cover the same amount of time as Genesis 12 to the NT. One reason I have always considered the first 11 chapters as different from the rest of the Bible.

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Not everywhere. All that sediment has to come from somewhere and most fills in low points or gets washed to the sea.

How do you explain new life on Pacific islands hundreds or thousands of miles from other land? Seeds are hardy and many can live on floating vegetation, even growing on it, forming an island of sorts
https://plants-archive.ifas.ufl.edu/manage/why-manage-plants/tussocks-and-floating-islands/

Sure there would. Ever seen a lake being drained? Fish get caught in depressions and gullys. As they dry up, instant dinner.

Do you see that behavior in carnivores today? Nope. They spread out to protect themselves and establish their own grounds. So would the herbivores.

You need to read up on what the global flood people say. And how does something get “washed to the sea” when the sea covers everything?

That life comes from a place that currently has life. The earth is totally covered with water, says you, so where does the life come from?

Per you it was months after the ark landed before they left. Don’t think there would be much left of any fish left lying in the sun for months.

And as they spread out the carnivores are going to be eating the herbivores. Again, don’t think that would work.

All of the problems disappear if you consider the flood regional and not global. Which means the problem is with the interpretation and not the science. There are several candidates for a regional flood that is the source for the story in Genesis.

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What characteristics would a geologic formation need in order to falsify a young Earth and a recent global flood?

It’s a big earth, and the continents are different. We should expect different kinds of flood geology in different areas, but some proof of floods in pretty much every place. I would expect to see areas with huge deposits of silt and fossils. Some areas with little to none, due to floodwater runoff. Chalk deposits laid down in a short period without millions of years of fossils through them. Same with the shells that make up diatomaceous earth.
One thing would be major erosion around the continents. Look at Florida. Almost no erosion around it.
The Mariana Trench. I would expect that to be a recent feature.
Lack of 500 million years of fossils in the Pacific Ocean, especially in the deep areas where there are no scavengers and little to no oxygen.
I would expect the oceans to show thousands of years of salt runoff from the land, not billions.

There is plenty of evidence, but neither the flood nor old age geology can be falsified or proven beyond doubt at this time.