ID/Creationism - How fast were extinctions?

[H3LL]

Now I'm no paleontologist, so I wonder if anyone can help me out with this one and follow the thinking below.

ID/Creationists make many wild claims, but for the sake of argument lets assume the claim is correct that the Earth is 6,000 years old.

We have a reasonable record of human history going back about 4,000 years both anecdotal biblical characters and good archeological evidence. I seem to remember reading that some Egyptian civilizations were as remote to ancient Romans a ancient Rome is to us, among other evidence.

No ID/Creationist denies the existence of fossils as they can see them, touch them and even use them in fun places like their "museums".

Many fossils, even to the untrained eye, are obviously not from creatures alive today.

There is no mention in the bible or records from old civilizations of prehistoric creatures.

This leaves us 2,000 years (being generous) to have all these creatures appear and disappear.

So the question: What must the rate of extinction have been for the fossil record creatures to have appeared and disappeared in 2,000 years?

I have an image of Ptrisha saying to her sick uncle;

"Ptommy, while you were lying in bed sick for the last week, you missed T-Rex. It ate Ptracy's cat, squashed all the vegetables in her garden and ruined her washing. Good job they're all extinct now".

Would a week be too long?

[MRC_Hans]

Like many other arguments, this has the weakness of being built on logic. If creationists were ready to apply logic to their belief system, they would not be creationists. ERGO: No amount of logic is going to sway a creationist.

The only reason to argue with such people is for the sake of possible fence-sitters.

Hans

[Throg]

Originally posted by H3LL

ID/Creationists make many wild claims, but for the sake of argument lets assume the claim is correct that the Earth is 6,000 years old.

We have a reasonable record of human history going back about 4,000 years both anecdotal biblical characters and good archeological evidence.

I suppose it depends on the definition of "good" archeological evidence but it is my understanding that there is archeological evidence going back substantially further than 6,000 years.

No ID/Creationist denies the existence of fossils as they can see them, touch them and even use them in fun places like their "museums".

Some creationists deny that fossils are what science has taken them to be. I have heard creationists state that they were placed by God as tests of our faith and that He even went so far as to make them appear much older than they are to make it a really good tests.

Creationists can be quite ingenious, if bafflingly forgiving of a God who would deliberately mislead us about the nature of the Universe.

[H3LL]

Originally posted by MRC_Hans
Like many other arguments, this has the weakness of being built on logic. If creationists were ready to apply logic to their belief system, they would not be creationists. ERGO: No amount of logic is going to sway a creationist.

The only reason to argue with such people is for the sake of possible fence-sitters.

Hans

I agree. Humour me. I have one hanging onto the fence by fingernails and I want them to fall on our side and start walking and not scramble back over and hide in fear. With luck they'll learn to run, sing and dance later.

Originally posted by Throg
I suppose it depends on the definition of "good" archeological evidence but it is my understanding that there is archeological evidence going back substantially further than 6,000 years.

Also agreed, but I was thinking more on the written record or that depicted in carvings etc. Pulling in cave paintings and other evidence jumps it away from the anecdotal biblical accounts and I was trying to keep it within an acceptable biblical context. I thought 4,000 years was reasonable on those terms, but I'm willing to change up or down. Whichever is more fundy plausible.

Originally posted by Throg
Some creationists deny that fossils are what science has taken them to be. I have heard creationists state that they were placed by God as tests of our faith and that He even went so far as to make them appear much older than they are to make it a really good tests.

This is claiming to know the mind of god and is not mentioned in the bible. Dodgy ground even for a fundy. I think I'm clear on that one If we stick to the bible writings.

Originally posted by Throg
Creationists can be quite ingenious, if bafflingly forgiving of a God who would deliberately mislead us about the nature of the Universe.

That's what you can expect from the mind of a being that loves his fruit more than his children.

[Throg]

Originally posted by H3LL
Also agreed, but I was thinking more on the written record or that depicted in carvings etc. Pulling in cave paintings and other evidence jumps it away from the anecdotal biblical accounts and I was trying to keep it within an acceptable biblical context. I thought 4,000 years was reasonable on those terms, but I'm willing to change up or down. Whichever is more fundy plausible.


I wouldn't like to try and guess what is going to be plausible to any particular fundamentalist. I vaguely remember a couple of line from "Inherit the Wind", in the creationist prosecutor asked about contradictions in the bible say:
"I do not think about those things I do not think about."
To which Spencer Tracy responds,
"Do you ever think about the things you do think about?"


This is claiming to know the mind of god and is not mentioned in the bible. Dodgy ground even for a fundy. I think I'm clear on that one If we stick to the bible writings.

I think you may be over-optimistic here. Despite claims to the contrary, fundamentalists never seem to stick to only what's in the bible. Good luck though. I'll keep watching this thread.

[MRC_Hans]

Originally posted by H3LL
I agree. Humour me. I have one hanging onto the fence by fingernails and I want them to fall on our side and start walking and not scramble back over and hide in fear. With luck they'll learn to run, sing and dance later.


*snip* Mmmokay. Well, we know of many thousand extict species, none of which have been observed as extant in historical times. We must also assume that they did not make it on Noa's Ark, since catering for the larger ones of them would have been tricky business indeed. This leaves us with only about a milliennium since Creation, where they could have flourished and died out. Quite a carnage, makes the present man-induced extinction rate look like a picnic.

A couple of other simple, shure-fire arguments:

Parasites. How did parasites, many of which cause life-threatening diseases exist while only Adam and Eve were on Earth? Did they have all those parasites? If yes, how did they suvive? Same during the Flood; did Noah and his family host all these parasites? (Of course, same applies to animal parasites)

Bacteria and vira. Essentially the same as parasites, but some fundies are in denial about infectuous diseases (they might, for instance, be homeopaths), so it is useful to keep micro- and macroscopic parasites separated.

Amount of water on Earth: There is not enough water on Earth to cover all land.

Starlight: We can observe stars that are far more than 6000 LY away. How can their light reach us?

Food-chains: This is one for ID'ers. ID'ers modify the timescale of genesis, and acknowledge that creation may have taken a very long time, but that doesn't fly; nearly all life forms are part of big ecosystems, food-chains. Miss one part of an ecosystem for any amount of time, and the whole system breaks down. So, either everything was created in a very short time, like six days, and ID'ers usually acknowledge that this is solidly contradicted by archeological evidence, or species evolved, filling in niches, replacing each other, etc. In short: Choose between fundie creation, or evolution, you can't go half-way.

Hans

[Bikewer]

I think it was in one of Gould's books, but not sure. Anyway, he had a marvelous description of the flood-surviving species fleeing at a breakneck pace from the Ark, just steps ahead of ever-advancing humanity, to take up their rightful places in the farflung corners of the Earth.

He envisioned the poor Koala, limping gamely across the continents and bravely swimming the Pacific to arrive in Australia...Perhaps carried over by the Aboriginies.

Of course, same Aborigines have an unbroken history of some 40,000 years....

[voidx]

Another problem with the flood has to do with marine wildlife. Did the sea's rise, or was it all from rain. At which point was the flood mostly freshwater or saltwater? If saltwater, then it covered the whole earth, so how did we end up with so many freshwater sources, and where did the freshwater fish come from, they'd all have died in saltwater over that period of time. Not to mention marine fish. Even if there was enough water to cover all the land, a flood of this size would drastically change the salinity of the oceans, again causing a massive die out of most marine wildlife.

The one trick truly fundy ID's attempt is to tie the 6 days of creation to the 6 major epochs of the universe. These don't line up well at all, and as already mentioned, plants and other things come before animals, or vice versa, so how did the majority of ecosystems that hinge on the symbiotic relationship between plant life and animals survive?

[Pyrts]

Originally posted by H3LL
Also agreed, but I was thinking more on the written record or that depicted in carvings etc. Pulling in cave paintings and other evidence jumps it away from the anecdotal biblical accounts and I was trying to keep it within an acceptable biblical context. I thought 4,000 years was reasonable on those terms, but I'm willing to change up or down. Whichever is more fundy plausible.

Well, written text in Egypt goes back to about 3,000 BC (5,000 years ago.) If you go into artifacts and non-written images(designs ... "clan markings") , then we can date with confidence to about 11,000 years ago in the US and about 30,000 years ago in Europe (small bone carving.)

But they don't accept that.

You can really drive them nuts with the Sumerian King List, which does list "The Flood" (not Noah's flood to them, but it could be argued that it IS): http://www.jameswbell.com/a002kinglist.html

They're showing 24,000 years for kings after the flood, 2400 years after the kingship moves to Uruk, and so on and so forth. I forget how much the total is, but it's over 60,000 years. Some of those kings tie into Biblical events, too.

[H3LL]

Thanks all.

The biodiversity argument and symbiotic/parasitic relationships are nice angles and concisely put.

The Sumarian King List (nice link) I will keep in my pocket for now.

I think it is important to be careful and respectful to beliefs at this stage. I didn't jump from believer to atheist in one day and I don't expect anybody else to do so and at this stage that's not my intention. Atheism IMHO is impossible to impose, it needs to be discovered. Sceptical in some areas will do for now.

Questioning statements from authority should be the first step and recognising valid evidence the next.

I'm hopeful.

We meet again on Sunday.

[FreeChile]

Some creationists have ducked this punch by being flexible in their beliefs. For example, certain denominations of the Judeo-Christian faith, no longer hold Genesis to be a story of creation. Instead, they interpret it symbolically or figuratively. They even conclude that it would be misleading to think of it in literal terms. In this particular faith, they have adjusted Genesis to mean a book about the revelation of the one and only God and not much else.

This leaves a lot of room for future adaptation.

[Throg]

Originally posted by FreeChile
Some creationists have ducked this punch by being flexible in their beliefs. For example, certain denominations of the Judeo-Christian faith, no longer hold Genesis to be a story of creation. Instead, they interpret it symbolically or figuratively. They even conclude that it would be misleading to think of it in literal terms. In this particular faith, they have adjusted Genesis to mean a book about the revelation of the one and only God and not much else.

This leaves a lot of room for future adaptation.

I always find this an even less convincing position that fundamentalism. If the Bible is no longer the literal word of God, why believe any of it?

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Throg
I always find this an even less convincing position that fundamentalism. If the Bible is no longer the literal word of God, why believe any of it?

Viewed as a tool for moral instruction, a fable is often both more easily understandable and more readily accessible than a literal truth.

I don't believe in the literal truth of Aesop's fable about "The Fox and the Grapes," but I do believe in the moral lesson it purports to teach.

[Throg]

Originally posted by new drkitten
Viewed as a tool for moral instruction, a fable is often both more easily understandable and more readily accessible than a literal truth.

I don't believe in the literal truth of Aesop's fable about "The Fox and the Grapes," but I do believe in the moral lesson it purports to teach.

True, but I don't suppose you believe in any of Aesop's fable as representations of fact.

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Throg
True, but I don't suppose you believe in any of Aesop's fable as representations of fact.

There's nothing that prevents a moral from having factual elements (King Alfred and the Cakes, for example).

The standard -- perhaps I should say a standard -- position among the non-literalists is that the historical accuracy of the Bible is somewhat variable (few people would disagree that Herod existed, or the city of Jerusalem, but the talking snake is a little questionable), but the moral directives presented are absolute truth.

Sorting the historic truth from the literary and metaphoric presumably requires a certain degree of expertise, and of course experts will differ in their sorting. Jerusalem almost certainly existed, but we can argue about Nazareth (and as archeology gets better, we will undoubtedly repeat our arguments over and over). But this particular process isn't confined to Biblical or religious scholarship by any means. Much of the task of ancient historians in general has been sorting the stories from the truths. Did Troy exist? How about Aeneas? King Arthur? Socrates? Pericles?

[Throg]

Originally posted by new drkitten


The standard -- perhaps I should say a standard -- position among the non-literalists is that the historical accuracy of the Bible is somewhat variable (few people would disagree that Herod existed, or the city of Jerusalem, but the talking snake is a little questionable), but the moral directives presented are absolute truth.

Sorting the historic truth from the literary and metaphoric presumably requires a certain degree of expertise, and of course experts will differ in their sorting. Jerusalem almost certainly existed, but we can argue about Nazareth (and as archeology gets better, we will undoubtedly repeat our arguments over and over). But this particular process isn't confined to Biblical or religious scholarship by any means. Much of the task of ancient historians in general has been sorting the stories from the truths. Did Troy exist? How about Aeneas? King Arthur? Socrates? Pericles?

All good points. As you point out, a degree of expertise is required and equally reference to multiple sources. Few would have seriously posited the existence of Troy based purely on the Homer, or Arthur purely on Mallory. On the other hand, most Christians have neither the expertise nor do they refer to multiple sources. The Bible is their only source for Bible history. For a fundamentalist this is to some extent defensible on the basis that it is an article of faith that the Bible is the literal word of God. If one abandons this position then it is much less defensible to calim that anything is true in virtue of the fact that it is in the Bible. It is difficult to see how even moral lessons can be justified on the basis of the Bible as authority once one abandons the fundamentalist position. If the Bible is not the word of God then how can one have confidence that the moral proscriptions and prescriptions contained therein are the word of God?

[seayakin]

Some of you have hinted about this, but a common defense for the extinction rate is the flood. (e.g. the dinosaurs et al. didn't make it on the ark). They can always argue that the more recent biodiversity is not due to evolution but to God simply creating more creatures after the flood.

I argued once with a Mormon about the flood and I said that there isn't enough water on the planet to create such a flood. He simply fell back on his crutch and said that God can make anything happen. I have seen more techical arguments where fundies proposed the earth was encircled by a band of water and this came down to create the flood.

[Mojo]

Originally posted by seayakin
Some of you have hinted about this, but a common defense for the extinction rate is the flood. (e.g. the dinosaurs et al. didn't make it on the ark).The flood seems to be used as a general cure-all for any holes in young-earth creationism.They can always argue that the more recent biodiversity is not due to evolution but to God simply creating more creatures after the flood.A variation of this, requiring no further creation by God (I don't think further creation after the first six days is mentioned in the Bible) is that the animals on the ark were representatives of "kinds" which could subsequently develop into other similar animals without evolution actually taking place, much as domestic dogs have been bred into many different shapes and sizes (I didn't say this idea is consistent with any actual facts...)
I argued once with a Mormon about the flood and I said that there isn't enough water on the planet to create such a flood. He simply fell back on his crutch and said that God can make anything happen. I have seen more techical arguments where fundies proposed the earth was encircled by a band of water and this came down to create the flood. Ah, the old "God dunnit" explanation! I wonder where the water went afterwards?

[Throg]

Originally posted by Mojo
A variation of this, requiring no further creation by God (I don't think further creation after the first six days is mentioned in the Bible) is that the animals on the ark were representatives of "kinds" which could subsequently develop into other similar animals without evolution actually taking place, much as domestic dogs have been bred into many different shapes and sizes (I didn't say this idea is consistent with any actual facts...)


Could we take this a stage further do you think, and have "template animals" on the ark, kind of walking batches of generic stem cells but containing all of the genetic sequences represented in the post-flood animal kingdom? It would drastically reduce space requirements on the ark. Of course, you'd need some pretty smart DNA manipulating enzymes to manage the realisation of all the distinct species we have now but I feel sure a deity like God could manage it.

[FreeChile]

Originally posted by Throg
I always find this an even less convincing position that fundamentalism. If the Bible is no longer the literal word of God, why believe any of it? They no longer hold it to be literal. They say it is "inspired" by God in some cases, similar to poetry, music or painting. This also makes the interpretation of it an inspiration by God, which is also used as an argument against non-believers because they, because of their lack of faith, would be devoid of this inspiration. So there's the catch 22: you have to believe in God to be capable of understanding the inspired word of God. Of course, this defense technique is not limited to the more liberal believers. Fundamentalists also react this way when confronted with some of the contradictions in their beliefs.

I would go a step further and say that other types of believers tend to behave this way, as well--always looking for a way out of any contradictions that may exist in a given belief.

[Throg]

Originally posted by FreeChile
They no longer hold it to be literal. They say it is "inspired" by God in some cases, similar to poetry, music or painting. This also makes the interpretation of it an inspiration by God, which is also used as an argument against non-believers because they, because of their lack of faith, would be devoid of this inspiration. So there's the catch 22: you have to believe in God to be capable of understanding the inspired word of God. Of course, this defense technique is not limited to the more liberal believers. Fundamentalists also react this way when confronted with some of the contradictions in their beliefs.

I would go a step further and say that other types of believers tend to behave this way, as well--always looking for a way out of any contradictions that may exist in a given belief.

That is rather a good "get out of jail free" card. I can't see particularly why one would need the Bible if already has direct access to his inspiration but perhaps, lacking inspiration I wouldn't. Has God split his message into two parts, the encoded word and the inspirational key to unlock it, or is the Bible in this instance something akin to a fetish - a focus for inspiration?

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Throg
That is rather a good "get out of jail free" card. I can't see particularly why one would need the Bible if already has direct access to his inspiration but perhaps, lacking inspiration I wouldn't. Has God split his message into two parts, the encoded word and the inspirational key to unlock it, or is the Bible in this instance something akin to a fetish - a focus for inspiration?

Perhaps a ladder? You need to use a ladder to reach a high spot -- but once you've reached the spot, you can throw the ladder away. (And, yes, I know that metaphor is not original. Wittgenstein used it first : "My propositions serve as elucidations in the following way: anyone who understands them eventually recognizes them as nonsensical, when he has used them -- as steps -- to climb up beyond them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed up it.)")

[FreeChile]

Originally posted by new drkitten
Perhaps a ladder? You need to use a ladder to reach a high spot -- but once you've reached the spot, you can throw the ladder away. (And, yes, I know that metaphor is not original. Wittgenstein used it first : "My propositions serve as elucidations in the following way: anyone who understands them eventually recognizes them as nonsensical, when he has used them -- as steps -- to climb up beyond them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed up it.)") Of course, that's assuming the ladder doesn't have any missing or broken rungs, or rungs that prevent ascension. If so, the ladder itself is useless. I don't know about you, but I prefer to use an elevator for very high places.

Also, it assumes the floor you're going to actually exists.

[Gr8wight]

You guys are all falling into the trap of attempting to apply scientific reasoning to justify religious dogma. The position of the creationists can be summed up by one single biblical quotation:

With God, all things are possible.

So, for a creationist, the answer to any question is, "because."

[pupdog]

How fast were extinctions? Some were faster than others. Certainly, of the extinctions of the past 100 years or so, some were pretty quick; those in Australia were probably among the fastest.

But the original question has problems. Dendrochronology provides dating back to about 12,000 years. That's already twice as old as the 6,000 years commonly given by some Biblical literalists. It's even older than most Young Earth Creationists are willing to begrudge.

Nevertheless, in the paleontology literature, I think there's figures for approximations of rates of "background extinctions" in papers dealing with episodes of accelerated extinction, such as at the Permian-Triassic boundary (the really big one), or the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (the popular one).

To try to fit extinction rates into YEC chronology is pretty pointless, but several writers have noted that speciation must have occurred at an exceedingly rapid pace if the Noachin Flood Myth were true.

[T'ai Chi]

Originally posted by H3LL

There is no mention in the bible or records from old civilizations of prehistoric creatures.


Well, as it goes, God created all things.

Giants, lizards, and bohemeths come up in the Bible I recall.

[Mojo]

Originally posted by pupdog
But the original question has problems. Dendrochronology provides dating back to about 12,000 years. That's already twice as old as the 6,000 years commonly given by some Biblical literalists. It's even older than most Young Earth Creationists are willing to begrudge.Ah yes, they will say, but God could have created the trees with all those extra rings to test our faith...

[pupdog]

Are you saying God is deceitful and not to be trusted?

[pupdog]

Whoops, excuse me, since that's not your argument, but the Creationist argument, it's the God-loving Creationists who would be claiming that God is deceitful and not to be trusted.

[Throg]

Originally posted by pupdog
Are you saying God is deceitful and not to be trusted?

You have missed the true subtlety and horror of the fundamentalist position: God is deceitful and he is to be trusted.

[Correa Neto]

[1inChrist mode]
Fossils, dendrochronology, lists of ancient sumerian kings, geochronology, the light of stars, these are all creations of SATAN!!! He uses logic and reasoning to move you away from God and doom your imortal sould to HELLFIRE
[/1inChrist mode]

That´s what a true fundie will tell you.

[Mojo]

Originally posted by Throg
You have missed the true subtlety and horror of the fundamentalist position: God is deceitful and he is to be trusted. He is also omniscient and omnipotent but not to be held responsible for anything that goes wrong.

[Throg]

Originally posted by Mojo
He is also omniscient and omnipotent but not to be held responsible for anything that goes wrong.

Nice work if you can get it.

[Nick Harman]

Hello everyone,


This is my first time in this forum. I am a biblical creationist. I believe the bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallable word of the only living God.

Genesis is the historical account of how God created the heavens and the earth. This account has no problem with fossils as some of your posts indicate. I believe a billions of years belief has more problems with fossils. The bible records the historical event of a world wide flood God used to judge the wicked people on the earth. If this is true, what would you expect to find? Billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. That is exactly what we find. If the layers we find were periods of time, how could we have all these fossils? If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it. So with out a ww flood, we would not have all the fossils that we are finding today.

The problem isn't the facts that scientists study, the problem is the interpretation. There are many scientists, who are biblical creationists, contrary to what many people believe (I can provide a good list if anyone is interested). A creationist has the same evidence the evolutionist has, it just has a different world view to interpret the evidence. A creationist has the historical account of God's word to interpret the evidence. An evolutionist has only his imagination and prior opinions of fallable men to interpret the same evidence. (i.e. uniformitarianism, geologic column, dating methods with assumptions, etc.)

That is all for now, I look forward to hearing from you all.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Nick Harman]

Here is your "pre-historic" animal

Job 40:15-18 (NKJV)
"Look now at the behemoth, which I made along with you;
He eats grass like an ox.
[16] See now, his strength is in his hips,
And his power is in his stomach muscles.
[17] He moves his tail like a cedar;
The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit.
[18] His bones are like beams of bronze,
His ribs like bars of iron.

Many comprimiser have said this is a hippo or a elephant. There tails do not move like a cedar.

Bible makes many mentions of dragons. The word dinosaur was not invented until the 1800's so you wouldn't find it in the bible. Many ancient drawings have pictures drawn of men and dinosaurs together.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Ashles]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
The bible records the historical event of a world wide flood God used to judge the wicked people on the earth. If this is true, what would you expect to find? Billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. That is exactly what we find. If the layers we find were periods of time, how could we have all these fossils? If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it. So with out a ww flood, we would not have all the fossils that we are finding today.
Hello and welcome. You will be popular here I assure you (assuming you are a serious poster).

Firstly I do not quite understand what you are saying. If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer? Fossils are spread throughout layers.

And why are there no dinosaurs now? Did Noah just decide not to take them?

And why are there no dinosaurs and human fossils in the same geological layers (if they were all killed at the same time)?

"If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it"
That might be what you would assume, but that is not always correct.
Here's a sinmple site (http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/dinosaurs/dinofossils/Fossilhow.html) that explains how fossils form.

Also, another question, if Adam and Eve gained knowledge, why were ancient people so primitive? They had stone and bone weapons and sketched crude cave paintings. Is that how Adam and Eve were when they left the garden of Eden?

[Ossai]

Nick Harman
Just a quick list of questions pulled from here and elsewhere. I’ve tried to remove duplicates. The one question I really want you to answer is exactly what do you believe? Is the bible to be taken literally or figuratively or a mixed bag, and how old do you believe the earth is?

I’ve got a few thousand more questions once you’ve hit these high points.

The whole silly flood thing.
Where did the water come from?
Where did the water go?

How many animals did Noah take on the ark?
How did they all fit on there?
How big was the ark?
Work the math for the buoyancy of the ark with and without the animals.
Now work the math allowing only the building materials available at that time.

How did the animals receive care, i.e. fed, waste removal, etc
If only ‘kinds’ were taken on the ark, name and give classifications.
If only ‘kinds’ were taken on the ark, explain how they developed species diversity afterwards at such a lightning quick pace.


From MRC_Hans
Parasites. How did parasites, many of which cause life-threatening diseases exist while only Adam and Eve were on Earth? Did they have all those parasites? If yes, how did they suvive? Same during the Flood; did Noah and his family host all these parasites? (Of course, same applies to animal parasites)

Bacteria and vira. Essentially the same as parasites, but some fundies are in denial about infectuous diseases (they might, for instance, be homeopaths), so it is useful to keep micro- and macroscopic parasites separated.

Starlight: We can observe stars that are far more than 6000 LY away. How can their light reach us?

Food-chains: This is one for ID'ers. ID'ers modify the timescale of genesis, and acknowledge that creation may have taken a very long time, but that doesn't fly; nearly all life forms are part of big ecosystems, food-chains. Miss one part of an ecosystem for any amount of time, and the whole system breaks down.

From voidx
Another problem with the flood has to do with marine wildlife. Did the sea's rise, or was it all from rain. At which point was the flood mostly freshwater or saltwater? If saltwater, then it covered the whole earth, so how did we end up with so many freshwater sources, and where did the freshwater fish come from, they'd all have died in saltwater over that period of time. Not to mention marine fish. Even if there was enough water to cover all the land, a flood of this size would drastically change the salinity of the oceans, again causing a massive die out of most marine wildlife.

From Pyrts
Well, written text in Egypt goes back to about 3,000 BC (5,000 years ago.) If you go into artifacts and non-written images(designs ... "clan markings") , then we can date with confidence to about 11,000 years ago in the US and about 30,000 years ago in Europe (small bone carving.)

You can really drive them nuts with the Sumerian King List, which does list "The Flood" (not Noah's flood to them, but it could be argued that it IS): http://www.jameswbell.com/a002kinglist.html

Ossai

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Hello everyone,


This is my first time in this forum. I am a biblical creationist. I believe the bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallable word of the only living God.

...snip...



Welcome to the forum.

Inerrant? How many of each creature did God tell Noah to take into the arc? How long did the flood last?

[LW]

Originally posted by Pyrts
Well, written text in Egypt goes back to about 3,000 BC (5,000 years ago.) If you go into artifacts and non-written images(designs ... "clan markings") , then we can date with confidence to about 11,000 years ago in the US and about 30,000 years ago in Europe (small bone carving.)

During my last Summer holiday I went through the king lists of The Chronicle of the Pharaohs counting regnal years. The results are posted here (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=44206).

[LW]

Originally posted by Bikewer
Of course, same Aborigines have an unbroken history of some 40,000 years....

No, they don't.

There's very strong physical evidence that Aborgines have been present in Australia for those 40,000 years but that is different from there being an unbroken history for the time since the term implies some sort of written accounts for events. What Aborgines have is40,000 years of prehistory.

[steenkh]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
That is all for now, I look forward to hearing from you all.

Hello Nick Harman,

Welcome! As Ashles has already told you, if you are for real, you will be a darling! Do not believe that we are trying to put you off by deluding you with requests for answers. The fact is that each of us is sitting here with lots of questions that we would like to put to an in-house creationist, and you might just fit the bill!

Now, my questions go like this:
Do you accept that evolution is observed right now and within a human time-scale? Speciation has been observed on birds within a human generation, and as far as I know it has been observed within mammals, insects, plants, and of course, bacteria. If you accept these facts, do you then also embrace the concept that all species were not created at once?

I think you know where all this leads, but I will give you some breathing space, before I continue!

[Bikewer]

Shall we amend my statement about the Australian natives to say they have a culture of that depth. I have read but little on these peoples, but I seem to recall continuous cave paintings and other artifacts of this age.

BTW, regarding the innerrant and infallible Bible, how do such believers reconcile the numerous well-documented errors and contradictions?
There are a couple of well-researched web sites, citing chapter and verse for the more obvious of these, so the doubter can go look em' up.

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Nick Harman

Genesis is the historical account of how God created the heavens and the earth. This account has no problem with fossils as some of your posts indicate. I believe a billions of years belief has more problems with fossils. The bible records the historical event of a world wide flood God used to judge the wicked people on the earth. If this is true, what would you expect to find? Billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. That is exactly what we find. If the layers we find were periods of time, how could we have all these fossils? If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it. So with out a ww flood, we would not have all the fossils that we are finding today.

Well, you're certainly correct that it's rather unlikely that any particular animal would die and produce fossils -- most animals, as you point out, are eaten and decay. But this simply addresses the vast majority of animals, and not all of them. As a simple example, even in the absence of a worldwide flood, animals sometimes die in (localized) floods and their bodies are buried in the river mud. Similarly, animals can die in landslides, get trapped in quicksand, or even simply die near rivers or oceans and be buried.

One problem that the world-wide flood actually creates is that it should have made too many fossils, more than we have been able to find. An example -- I believe that there are a total of six actual T-rex fossils that have been found, worldwide. If the entire T-rex population had been wiped out in a global flood and fossilized, then we shoud expect to see a much larger population than six. (Even the seriously endangered snow leopard still has an estimated population about a thousand times greater.)

Beyond that, the major problem with the world-wide flood is that, although it might be expected to produce lots of fossils, it wouldn't be expected to produce the same distribution of fossils that we see. For example, "billions of ead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. That is exactly what we find." But if they were all laid down at the same time in a global flood, then why do some rock layers have different fossils than others? Why don't we find trilobites in the same rock layers that we see mammals and bird in? Why don't we find the jawless fishes in the same strata as the dinosaurs? For that matter, why don't we find Olenellina triliobites in the same rock layers as the Proetida[, when we find both kinds of trilobites all over the world?

[sackett]

I posted the following paragraph some years back, in a thread addressing this business of creationism. It didn't stir much interest then, but I'll try it again.

Way back in the 1920's, Sam Knight, Sr., one of the best paleontologists in the U.S., had a prepared lecture for Geology 101 at the University of Wyoming. In it, he summarized the principal geological eras, comparing each one with a day in the Book of Genesis. With surprisingly little snipping and tucking, he showed how you could treat historical geology and Genesis together, finding parallels in the evolution of life and the biblical account. He ended the lecture (and put the topic to rest for the remainder of the course) by observing that "the Bible says God made the world, but it doesn't say how He did it." It was a neat, non-controversial lecture, and I don't see how any Christian or other believer could find fault with it.

I know about this lecture because my mother took Geol. 101 at the U. of Wyoming back then, and she enjoyed Sam Knight's cleverness. In the 1920's, the doctrine of Biblical literalism was just getting on its feet (there was a surprisingly parallel movement among Egyptian Muslims at exactly the same time), and it was still possible to soothe disputation with an application of reasonableness.

I think biblical literalism can be regarded as a disease of deficiency in Western society: The West lacks a tradition of parable and extended metaphor. The Hebrews who assembled Genesis never believed for a moment that those Bronze Age bedtime stories were literally true; they knew the difference between a folktale and a serious chronicle. (I use the word "assembled" intentionally. Genesis reads very like a bunch of scrolls rolled up together and preserved all higgeldy-piggle. This probably came out of a pious fear of destroying anything written that might possibly contain the name of God, a well-attested superstition among old-time Jews.) Unfortunately, the West borrowed the Old Testament when it adopted Christianity, and as so often happens when people borrow things from another culture, they got the emphases wrong. The creation myth and flood account in Genesis are no more satisfying than any others, but if they come wrapped up in a popular cult, people tend to buy them. Eastern exoticism didn't hurt either; heck, everybody enjoys the Arabian Nights.

None of this addresses the plain fact that the current scientific understanding of the earth's history is supported by a Himalaya of evidence, while creationism rests solely on belief - a particularly ill-informed belief that would, it's been said, embarrass a tribal shaman.

I've said this before, but it bears repeating: If scientists ever discovered even a speck of evidence in support of creationism, there'd be shoving and elbowing to see who could publish first.

[Nick Harman]

I certainly do not have time to answer all the questions in an everyone against 1 setting. I will respond mostly to the shortest responses. I have about 1 hour per day for this, so I am very limited. I will start with steenkh

Now, my questions go like this:
Do you accept that evolution is observed right now and within a human time-scale? Speciation has been observed on birds within a human generation, and as far as I know it has been observed within mammals, insects, plants, and of course, bacteria. If you accept these facts, do you then also embrace the concept that all species were not created at once?

Answer: I accept variation, or if you will, micro-evolution. You are implying a common misunderstanding about creationist. We do not believe everything was created in its present form. Any one can observe changes with in kinds. Your science ends and your faith begins when you start telling me about macro changes. Dogs always produce dogs, cats pro. cats, etc. The textbooks you have studied give you loads of examples of variations and then you are supposed to believe in macro evolution. Your last question: my answer is as the bible says God created everything in 6 days. I also acknowledge per observable science that animals can change but there are limits. All for now.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Nick Harman]

To Bikewer:

you told everyone about errors in the bible but you didn't mention any. Go to your site and pick any 3 and I will refute them. Don't have much time today, so it may be another day for my response.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Ashles]

What about my questions? I asked first. :(

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman


...snip... Your last question: my answer is as the bible says God created everything in 6 days. ...snip...

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

Just a point of correction Genesis does not say that God created everything, the Bible only says that God created light.

[Nick Harman]

Firstly I do not quite understand what you are saying. If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer? Fossils are spread throughout layers.

Answer: they are not buried in the same order, ie humans and animals (more intelligent life forms) survive longer before drowning and being buried. This is not a flood from a bunch of rain. Genesis 7:11 (KJV)
In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
--the water came from in the earth (fountains of deep) we find water deep in earth still today. And it is believed that there was a canopy of water over the earth (windows of heaven). This protected the earth, i.e. uv rays, which is what allowed humans to live so long (900 years, etc.)

Question: can you explain marine fossils on top of mountains?

I am out of time for now, I will finish later.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

__________________

[alfaniner]

Originally posted by steenkh
Hello Nick Harman,
...Do not believe that we are trying to put you off by deluding you with requests for answers...

I believe you meant "deluging"? A simple typo perhaps, but it changes the tone and the intent of the post.

:D

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman


...snip...

And it is believed that there was a canopy of water over the earth (windows of heaven).

...snip...

Believed - on what grounds? What Biblical passages?

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
[H]umans and animals (more intelligent life forms) survive longer before drowning and being buried.

So is this why we don't find Olenellina trilobites in the same rock layers as the [/i]Proetida[/i]? The Proteda were more intelligent?

Similarly, the fossil tortoise genus Stylemys is typically found in "recent" (Ogliocene) strata, much more recent than the Cretaceous strata in which the fossil primate genus Purgatorius is found. I'd be extremely surprised if you could find a tortoise that was as intelligent as any mammal, let alone a primate.

But, of course, plants sort the geological column as well. Flowering plants, for example, are generally found near the top of the geological column, while ferns are found much lower -- and of course various extinct species of plants (of all sorts) appear for a limited time and then cease to exist in the record. Were pine trees that much more intelligent than ferns, but dumber than magnolias? And, for that matter, were magnolias that much dumber than sunflowers? I know you're not going to try to tell me that sunflowers were also smarter than dinosaurs.

Do you have any other basis for judging that intelligence is the primary reason different fossils appear in different strata?


Question: can you explain marine fossils on top of mountains?


Of course. Elementary geography; the land where the fossils were deposited has risen since then. In many areas of the world, the rate at which mountains are rising is actually measurable from year to year. For example, in the Hudson Bay area of Canda, we can measure about 3cm of uplift per year.

Over two hundred thousand years, this would give us mountains 6000 meters tall. Over five hundred thousand years, this would give us mountains 15000 meters tall, which would tower over Everest if mountains didn't also erode.

[MRC_Hans]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
*snip*
Question: can you explain marine fossils on top of mountains?

*snip* Answer: Yes.

Hans

[Mojo]

Originally posted by new drkitten
So is this why we don't find Olenellina trilobites in the same rock layers as the [/i]Proetida[/i]? The Proteda were more intelligent?If a marine animal isn't intelligent enough to avoid drowning it's certainly got problems.:D

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Mojo
If a marine animal isn't intelligent enough to avoid drowning it's certainly got problems.:D

Well, with all that fresh water falling from the sky -- sorry, coming up from the fountains of the deep -- sorry, being defenestrated from the bay windows of Heaven -- whatever -- it might have adjusted the salt levels enough to kill all the marine animals.

Of course, it also managed to kill all the extinct freshwater species as well. So I guess there were at least two windows in heaven, one of them defenestrating salt water and one defenestrating fresh. Which suggests that God not only has problems with His plumbing, but with His water softener as well. I hope that He has good heavenowners' insurance.

[Ashles]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Firstly I do not quite understand what you are saying. If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer? Fossils are spread throughout layers.

Answer: they are not buried in the same order, ie humans and animals (more intelligent life forms) survive longer before drowning and being buried. This is not a flood from a bunch of rain. Genesis 7:11 (KJV)
Oh I see. You think different geological layers happen within, like, 20 minutes of each other.
Right.

In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
--the water came from in the earth (fountains of deep) we find water deep in earth still today. And it is believed that there was a canopy of water over the earth (windows of heaven). This protected the earth, i.e. uv rays, which is what allowed humans to live so long (900 years, etc.)
Okay so you don't know why people age either. Good, good...

Question: can you explain marine fossils on top of mountains?
Uh yes. Most people can. It's called plate tectonics.
You may have heard of it - it killed a bunch of people in Asia recently.

You are joking presumably. I mean this level of argument isn't going to stand up for 2 minutes.

Are you serious Nick? If so where did you learn all this nonsense?

[Nick Harman]

Certainly intelligence wouldn't be the only factor. Whatever is at the bottom will be buried 1st. I certainly cannot scientifically prove a flood. The flood seems so foreign to you because you reject the word of the God who created and will judge you. It is interesting to hear intellectuals scoff at a creationist when evolutionist/atheists believe in life evolving from non-life, animals in the past doing something that has never been and never will be observed. So to close for this evening I say the problem isn't the evidence, it is the interpretation. I will not have much time tomorrow, and again it is impossible for me to address hardly any of your comments, but I certainly enjoy the conversation. And would love to see you all come to faith in the God of this universe.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Ashles]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Certainly intelligence wouldn't be the only factor. Whatever is at the bottom will be buried 1st. I certainly cannot scientifically prove a flood. The flood seems so foreign to you because you reject the word of the God who created and will judge you. It is interesting to hear intellectuals scoff at a creationist when evolutionist/atheists believe in life evolving from non-life, animals in the past doing something that has never been and never will be observed. So to close for this evening I say the problem isn't the evidence, it is the interpretation. I will not have much time tomorrow, and again it is impossible for me to address hardly any of your comments, but I certainly enjoy the conversation. And would love to see you all come to faith in the God of this universe.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman
Well I shall leave all your mistakes to others, I shall merely ask - have you ever heard of plate tectonics and how it works?
And if you have do you deny its existence?

[drkitten]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
The flood seems so foreign to you because you reject the word of the God who created and will judge you.

The BIblical Flood also seems foreign to me because, as you describe it, it violates much of what I already know about other localized floods for which there is demonstrated evidence.

It's as if you described a particular Biblical event as being caused by the ravenous man-eating clams that would jump out of trees and scare passers-by with their nasty sharp teeth.

I mean, yeah, I wouldn't consider the event's credibility to be enhanced merely because it was Biblical. But I think that I can reject the story for other reasons than merely reflexive rejecting of the word of God.

Clams don't eat men
Clams don't live in trees
Clams don't jump
Clams don't have teeth

Similarly, floods don't leave neatly sorted sedimentary layers of different type. Floods don't leave drowned animals neatly sorted by apparent age. Floods don't put rocks with different potassium/argon ratios in different groups.

And, as Mojo pointed out, floods don't usually drown marine animals.

Except maybe for the arboreal carnivorous toothed jumping clams.

[Ossai]

Nick Harman

Answer: they are not buried in the same order, ie humans and animals (more intelligent life forms) survive longer before drowning and being buried. This is not a flood from a bunch of rain. Genesis 7:11 (KJV)
In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
--the water came from in the earth (fountains of deep) we find water deep in earth still today. And it is believed that there was a canopy of water over the earth (windows of heaven). This protected the earth, i.e. uv rays, which is what allowed humans to live so long (900 years, etc.)

Where did the water come from?
Where is the water now?

Work the math. Even the folks over at AIG don’t use the ‘water canopy’ excuse anymore.

Question: can you explain marine fossils on top of mountains?
Yes.
Very, very short answer. - hey it's been a while since I had bio & geo ;)
Marine animal dies.
Sinks to bottom – usually but not always bone by this point.
Silt covers remains.
And a few thousands of years for compression, (can’t remember the name of the process where the surrounding minerals replace parts of the bone).
A few thousands more years and you have something called plate tetonics.
Mountains go up (one good example is looking at where the Indian subcontinent abuts Asia – there are other ways as well), wind, erosion, etc, some of the fossils are exposed.

Now your turn.
Explain the white Cliffs of Dover.

Certainly intelligence wouldn't be the only factor. Whatever is at the bottom will be buried 1st. I certainly cannot scientifically prove a flood. That is exactly our point. If there were a world wide catastrophe within the past 10,000 years there would be evidence all over the place, literally. There is no evidence.

It is interesting to hear intellectuals scoff at a creationist when evolutionist/atheists believe in life evolving from non-life, animals in the past doing something that has never been and never will be observed. You’re not up on current science there by any means. Ongoing experiments are doing exactly that – life from nonliving. BTW – Virus is it alive or dead?

So to close for this evening I say the problem isn't the evidence, it is the interpretation. Well considering that no YEC has ever presented any evidence, hypothesis, theories, or even SWAGs, how can we be accused of miss-interpretation?

Ossai

[H3LL]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
....I certainly cannot scientifically prove a flood....

So we have:

Gap in my knowledge = God did it

It saves all that tiresome reading and is sooo easy.

Instead of the usual attack evolution from a position of ignorance that we are very used to here I would like to pose a favourite one of my own. (see signature).

You claim what you say is science (it isn't BTW). Science is a method used to predict observable events among other things.

Would you be so kind as to inform us of any practical use or any predictions that your so-called "science" can make.

If it helps, you can show us how your "science" deals with with what is stated here:

The Molecular Sequence Evidence (http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section4.html)

Please feel free to show us how your "science" would make the predictions or quote any biblical passage that have an alternative solution.

If not, you make my signature true.

[Nick Harman]

I have heard of the theory of plate techtonics. Many biblical creationists believe in plate techtonics but it is a catastrophic model, rather than the evolutionist fairy tale of millions and millions of years. Time is the key to evolutionary science. You believe in things that can not be observed as do I. The difference is that biblical creationists have a historical record to interpret the evidence. You say I use the flood or God did it to explain everything, well your ideas are rationalized by millions and millions of years to explain why things that will never be observed are true. The fossil record does not support slow changes because there are no intermediate fossils. That is why one of your high priests Stephen Gould had to switch to punctuated equilibrium to explain the lack of fossil evidence. There is nothing wrong with having different views. Among biblical creationists (not comprimised creationists, I don't speak for them while they are still sincere christians) there are different views on things such as plate techtonics, continental drift, etc. My point is that you all imply that evolution is a closed deal, it is a fact, but actually it is severely flawed. All for now and probably the rest of the day. See you all tomorrow.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick Harman

[Nick Harman]

I am impressed with the evolutionist faith to believe soft tissue survived 70 million years. First time rbc's were found, you all were in denial, now you have had to accept it when it is found with soft tissue.

In Christ,
Nick

[MRC_Hans]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
I have heard of the theory of plate techtonics. Many biblical creationists believe in plate techtonics but it is a catastrophic model, rather than the evolutionist fairy tale of millions and millions of years.

Plate tectonics can be proved. We can actually observe them moving.

Time is the key to evolutionary science. You believe in things that can not be observed as do I.

Wrong. We interpret observable evidence. Tons (literally) of it.

The difference is that biblical creationists have a historical record to interpret the evidence.

No. You have a collection of legends. Some of which are contradictory, as I'm sure some people have pointed out to you.

You say I use the flood or God did it to explain everything, well your ideas are rationalized by millions and millions of years to explain why things that will never be observed are true.

Many of these things can be verified by current observations.

The fossil record does not support slow changes because there are no intermediate fossils.

Wrong. There are plenty.

That is why one of your high priests Stephen Gould had to switch to punctuated equilibrium to explain the lack of fossil evidence.

No. Observations show that that is what sometimes happens.

My point is that you all imply that evolution is a closed deal, it is a fact, but actually it is severely flawed.

Do point out the flaws.



Hans

[MRC_Hans]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
I am impressed with the evolutionist faith to believe soft tissue survived 70 million years. First time rbc's were found, you all were in denial, now you have had to accept it when it is found with soft tissue.

In Christ,
Nick rbc's? What is that?

Hans

[Ossai]

Nick Harman
I have heard of the theory of plate techtonics. Many biblical creationists believe in plate techtonics but it is a catastrophic model, rather than the evolutionist fairy tale of millions and millions of years.
Three examples have already been given – one catastrophic the earthquake that caused the tsunami, one easily measurable on a human time scale – British Columbia and one where the Indian subcontinent abuts Asia.

The fossil record does not support slow changes because there are no intermediate fossils. Ok, your ignorance is really showing on this one.
Go to http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/hominids.html (http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/hominids.html) and look for yourself. If you want to see them in person travel to Washington DC and visit the Smithsonian.

I am impressed with the evolutionist faith to believe soft tissue survived 70 million years. First time rbc's were found, you all were in denial, now you have had to accept it when it is found with soft tissue. Not only do you not provide a link, but you apparently didn’t read the original paper your ignorance is founded upon.

Ossai

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
I am impressed with the evolutionist faith to believe soft tissue survived 70 million years. First time rbc's were found, you all were in denial, now you have had to accept it when it is found with soft tissue.

In Christ,
Nick

Hi Nick people are being good enough to answer your questions about their claims do you think you could be good enough to answer my questions about your claims?

Thanks in advance

[Ashles]

And Nick, could you answer my question about why Humans and Dinosaurs are never found in the same geological layers?

I asked it in my first post to you.

And how can plate tectonics be purely a catastrophic model? It can only be catastrophic if the plates really do move in relation to each other. If you accept that they really do move then you have to accept the whole process. It makes absolutely no sense othewise (and contradicts what we observe perfectly clearly).

[H3LL]

Nick is avoiding answering.

I feel it is pointless us all just offering alternatives to any statement he can imagine or fantasise about.

The primary claim is that he is talking about a "science".

There is no evidence that it is either a science or follows the scientific method.

Calling it a science does not make it one.

The scientific method can be summarised such:


1. Observation and description of a phenomenon or group of phenomena.

2. Formulation of an hypothesis to explain the phenomena.

3. Use of the hypothesis to predict the existence of other phenomena, or to predict quantitatively the results of new observations.

4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments.

1 and 2 he is safe with. Lets see how he does with 3 and 4.

The theory of evolution meets all the above requirements. Nick's fantasy does not, unless he can show otherwise.

Failure means it is just another belief system and fairy story and not valid as a science.

[Mojo]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
The fossil record does not support slow changes because there are no intermediate fossils.The fossil record frequently comes up with intermediate fossils. for example, creationists used to ask to be shown a fossil of a whale with legs. Fossils of primitive whales with vestigial legs have been found (although I suspect it will be a while before creationists stop asking for them - that's a big problem if you're in the habit of ignoring the evidence).

Of course, this now means that there are new gaps for the creationists to point to, on either side of the whales with legs...:rolleyes:

[FFed]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
The problem isn't the facts that scientists study, the problem is the interpretation. There are many scientists, who are biblical creationists, contrary to what many people believe (I can provide a good list if anyone is interested).

Welcome.

I am interested, please provide the list.

[Ashles]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
I am impressed with the evolutionist faith to believe soft tissue survived 70 million years. First time rbc's were found, you all were in denial, now you have had to accept it when it is found with soft tissue.

In Christ,
Nick
That's true. If we are presented with undeniable evidence we have to accept it. That's the scientific approach.

By the way I would like to see your list of list of biblical creationist scientists too.

Also, you still haven't answered any of the questions I originally asked.

(Except for the fossils in different layers question. And your answer is terrible in a variety of different ways.
But just one flaw with your answer is - why are there so many marine fossils lower than humans? Did the marine animals drown before humans? Why did NO humans die straight away. Why, in essence, are humans not ever found in the same layers as certain types of animal (eg dinosaurs)?)

[Nick Harman]

Nick is avoiding answering.

It looks like I may be the only person in here with a job and a family, I am lucky if I get an hour, and I am responding to many people w/many questions as opposed to 1 person. Give me a break.

In Christ,
Nick

[cthiax]

Nick,

If God would work through a flood (rather than just willing the death and removal of all life on Earth directly), why mightn't God work through another force or process?

Even if you accept that everything in the Bible is true, do you believe that everything true is in the Bible?

[Ashles]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
It looks like I may be the only person in here with a job and a family.
Hmm that sounded a little bit like an insult.
Nobody has insulted you Nick, only asked you questions. I'm pretty sure most people here have jobs and families too.

[Nick Harman]

I apologize, I didn't mean to sound ugly. It was a sarcastic/humorous response answer my question, no my question, he is avoiding the question, what about my question. I certainly wonder where you all get the time, but I didn't intend it as an insult. Talk to you later.

In Christ,
Nick

[Nick Harman]

Here is the list from answersingenesis.com. you can read about them on the site. I am out of time for the day, as I mentioned yesterday I would have very little time today. I believe Saturday, I should be able to look at many of your questions, you have priority Ashles if not before then.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick

Note: Individuals on this list must possess a doctorate in a science-related field.

Dr Paul Ackerman, Psychologist
Dr James Allan, Geneticist
Dr Steve Austin, Geologist
Dr S.E. Aw, Biochemist
Dr Thomas Barnes, Physicist
Dr Don Batten, Plant physiologist, tropical fruit expert
Dr John Baumgardner, Electrical Engineering, Space Physicist, Geophysicist, expert in supercomputer modeling of plate tectonics
Dr Jerry Bergman, Psychologist
Dr Kimberly Berrine, Microbiology & Immunology
Prof. Vladimir Betina, Microbiology, Biochemistry & Biology
Dr Raymond G. Bohlin, Biologist
Dr Andrew Bosanquet, Biology, Microbiology
Dr David R. Boylan, Chemical Engineer
Prof. Linn E. Carothers, Associate Professor of Statistics
Dr David Catchpoole, Plant Physiologist (read his testimony)
Prof. Sung-Do Cha, Physics
Dr Eugene F. Chaffin, Professor of Physics
Dr Choong-Kuk Chang, Genetic Engineering
Prof. Jeun-Sik Chang, Aeronautical Engineering
Dr Donald Chittick, Physical Chemist
Prof. Chung-Il Cho, Biology Education
Dr Harold Coffin, Palaeontologist
Dr Bob Compton, DVM
Dr Ken Cumming, Biologist
Dr Jack W. Cuozzo, Dentist
Dr William M. Curtis III, Th.D., Th.M., M.S., Aeronautics & Nuclear Physics
Dr Malcolm Cutchins, Aerospace Engineering
Dr Lionel Dahmer, Analytical Chemist
Dr Raymond V. Damadian, M.D., Pioneer of magnetic resonance imaging
Dr Chris Darnbrough, Biochemist
Dr Bryan Dawson, Mathematics
Dr Douglas Dean, Biological Chemistry
Prof. Stephen W. Deckard, Assistant Professor of Education
Dr David A. DeWitt, Biology, Biochemistry, Neuroscience
Dr Don DeYoung, Astronomy, atmospheric physics, M.Div
Dr Geoff Downes, Creationist Plant Physiologist
Dr Ted Driggers, Operations research
Dr André Eggen, Geneticist
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[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Nick is avoiding answering.

It looks like I may be the only person in here with a job and a family, I am lucky if I get an hour, and I am responding to many people w/many questions as opposed to 1 person. Give me a break.

In Christ,
Nick

Don’t feel pressured by the questions. My suggestion, especially to a new Member, would be deal with each question as it comes up. The time taken to answer doesn’t really matter, just that an attempt is made to answer them.

In my opinion what can sometimes cause friction here is when a Member seems to be willing to ask question after question but doesn't answer questions asked of him or her by another poster.

Another suggestion is about making claims. Quite often new Members seem quite perplexed and almost shocked at what I’m sure can seem like a pathological desire from Members to seek evidence for claims. You can make what you think is a simple “everyday statement” that “everyone knows that” and suddenly find you’re being asked to support your “everyday statement”, you may not even realise that it did contain many assumptions. Don’t take this personally, it’s just this is a board which (probably) has a high percentage of people who like to ask questions and learn.

(If I didn’t add this paragraph you’d probably see some Members ask me to support the claims I made above – I will attempt to avoid that by making it very clear the above is purely my subjective view and I do not have evidence to support my opinions – so there! :) )

[Ashles]

Thanks for that. Research - we love this.

Firstly, of course, it has to be mentioned that having a PhD does not stop you believing in whatever you want to believe. And it certainly doesn't mean your beliefs are based on scientific principles.
For example I picked a name at random "Dr John Baumgardner" and saw that his arguments were extremely poor.

His speciality is plate tectonics and he appears to believe in a catastrophic view. (But I didnt actually notice anywhere that he said he believed the world was only 6,000 years old - I may have missed that part).

Also he makes a big deal of a catastrophic event that recent evidence indicates may have happened on Venus. It may be worth mentioning that, er, Venus doesn't have life on it. The comparison seems entirely irrelevant. His arguments are, to be honest, not those of a scientist.
He talks about the unlikihood of the DNA 'code' arising by chance.
Does he really not understand that it is not really a code as we think of it. It is not symbol that refer to other things - as Talk Origins puts it: T"he protein itself is a physical object whose function is determined by its physical properties".

Whatever his PhD is in it is certainly not biology, paleontology or, well, quite a lot of things apparently.

[Ashles]

Here's what Dr Henry Zuill thinks (accorrding to this page (http://www.freewebs.com/scottyspot/scientificproofofcreation.htm)):

Biodiversity in nature is something that gives strong support for creation in six days simply because of the fact that so many species are interdependent on each other, that is to say if you take a certain number of organism types out of a diverse ecological area then the whole system will become unable to sustain itself. It appears that life on earth is what makes life possible on earth. The truth of the preceding statement rules out the possibility that life evolved from some chemical stew rather than being created already fully formed and integrated within the environment is a short period of days.
If scientists were priests this guy would be defrocked.

Many, many times have certain animals been removed from closed diverse environments (e.g. islands) or new animals been introduced. The system continues to sustain itself. This is a ridiculous and unjustifiable claim.
And if "so many species are interdependent on each other" that "if you take a certain number of organism types out of a diverse ecological area then the whole system will become unable to sustain itself" what effect, exactly do you think flooding the entire world would have?

It would be very tedious to go through all of these scientists and pick their errors apart one by one (although it appears it would not be too hard).
Instead why don't you tell us which you think are their most convincing arguments and we can look at those.
(Edited to add - actually this is unfair - you've been asked enough questions already. You can take your time with the previous questions before you get to these scientists - however I might keep picking the odd one out to mention)

[Hutch]

Folks, I am as interested as the rest of you in what Nick has to say, and he seems willing enough to share, but I would note that he is coming at this from a completely different perspective than most of us are.

In the April issue of Smithsonian Magazine (great perk for membership, IMHO), there is an article about Dayton, TN (the location of the Scopes 'monkey' trial). In that article they discuss Bryan College, a Fundamentalist University in Dayton, and Dr. Kurt Wise, who studied under Steven Jay Gould and indeed does have a Phd from Harvard--and he is also a YEC.

To quote from the magazine:

..."God's truth should be used to interpret--to properly interpret--all the data in the universe," Wise writes in his 2002 book, Faith, Form and Time. "All the stars of the universe, all the rocks of the earth, all the organisms on its surface must be reinterperted, as well as the worlds literature, philosophies, and religions. They can and should be reinterperted from a Christian perspective so all these things can be taken captive under the mind of Christ."

What do most other paleontologists and geologists think of this? "Absolute bunk!" says Wise with a laugh. Does he believe evolution is flawed in and of itself, or flawed because it contradicts Genesis? His answer could have come straight from the college's namesake himself: "Scripture trumps interpretations of physical data."

(Italics and Underlining mine. Any spelling mistakes are mine also)

And that is why, interesting as I hope this discussion is, there will be no real debate. Nick holds what he fervently believes is the trump card and no questions or arguments on the actual physical data will matter in the end.

[fishbob]

Nick Harmon: Here is the list from answersingenesis.com

Nick - your list includes dentists and quacks. Now here is a list for you:

Project Steve (http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/articles/3697_the_list_2_16_2003.asp)

NCSE Project Steve
NCSE's "Project Steve" is a tongue-in-cheek parody of a long-standing creationist tradition of amassing lists of "scientists who doubt evolution" or "scientists who dissent from Darwinism." (For examples of such lists, see the FAQs.)

Creationists draw up these lists to convince the public that evolution is somehow being rejected by scientists, that it is a "theory in crisis." Most members of the public lack sufficient contact with the scientific community to know that this claim is totally unfounded. NCSE has been exhorted by its members to compile a list of thousands of scientists affirming the validity of the theory of evolution, but although we easily could have done so, we have resisted such pressure. We did not wish to mislead the public into thinking that scientific issues are decided by who has the longer list of scientists!

Project Steve mocks this practice with a bit of humor, and because "Steves" are only about 1% of scientists, it incidentally makes the point that tens of thousands of scientists support evolution. And it honors the late Stephen Jay Gould, NCSE supporter and friend.

[Marvel Frozen]

I notice Nick Harmon's list only has 3 steves, Project Steve has 513 signers (as of November 8, 2004). Hmmm .....

[Mojo]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Here is the list from answersingenesis.com. you can read about them on the site.
But, at a quick count, only three of them are called Steve (http://www.ncseweb.org/article.asp?category=18) (well, maybe four as Dr S.E. Aw could be a closet Steve).

Edited to add: Rats! Beaten to it! That's what comes of not noticing the thread has gone onto another page...

[Nick Harman]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ashles
[B]Hello and welcome. You will be popular here I assure you (assuming you are a serious poster).

If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer?
Answer: Put water and dirt in a jar, shake it up and watch it work, you will not see 1 layer.

And why are there no dinosaurs now? Did Noah just decide not to take them?
Answer: He took them on the ark as the bible says he took two of every kind. Not 2 of every dog, or every horse, but kind. You have a picture of taking every species, but this is not the case. So this would limit the number of dinosaurs required. I have read that the average size of a dinosaur is a sheep, so not all dinosaurs are these massive creatures. So yes he took them and most dinosaurs are extinct. You will scoff at this, but there are many eyewitness accounts of dinosaur like creatures. Loch Ness, Lake Champlaign, etc. Pictures of dinosaurs have been shown to tribes in relatively unexplored places like the congo and places in Africa, and they say they have seen these animals. We know of gigantic snakes. So while I am certainly not dogmatic about some dinosaurs existing today, some people and tribes would say they do in remote unexplored areas. Last comment on the ark is that it took over 100 years to build and God gave the dimmensions in cubits, there have been some large skeletons found, we do not know how big Noah and his son's were, how big was that cubit? Again, not scientific fact I understand, but interesting things to think about.

And why are there no dinosaurs and human fossils in the same geological layers (if they were all killed at the same time)?
Answer: Already mentioned intelligence, people could hold out longer, i.e. rafts, grabbing on to things and floating, etc. A dead person would float also. More factors are involved but this is one, and I do not claim to be the top authority on this or any of the matters discussed.

"If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it"
That might be what you would assume, but that is not always correct.
Here's a sinmple site (http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/dinosaurs/dinofossils/Fossilhow.html) that explains how fossils form.
Answer: maybe I didn't read enough, but what I saw was talking about burial to preserve and begin depositing the minerals to start the fossilizing. I do not believe we would have as many fossils if we were limiting it to many local events.

Also, another question, if Adam and Eve gained knowledge, why were ancient people so primitive? They had stone and bone weapons and sketched crude cave paintings. Is that how Adam and Eve were when they left the garden of Eden?
Answer: I think "ancient" man was smarter than we give him credit for. Artifacts of metals are found in "primitive layers." The Egyptians built the pyramids, and what I have been told is that we couldn't do that today. Look how much we have progressed in this past century (technologically speaking only, our world is getting more and more chaotic everyday, no one can deny this, so we are certainly not better off). So I am not sure what the issue is here.

Serving a risen Savior,
Nick

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
[...snip...


Answer: He took them on the ark as the bible says he took two of every kind. Not 2 of every dog, or every horse, but kind.

...snip...
Nick

Nick - that is not what the bible says.

I asked you this question a few posts ago:

How many of each creature did God tell Noah to take into the arc?

Can I suggest you go and re-read the relevant section of the Bible before you answer it?

[Dr Adequate]

The trouble is that Nick's quite uncritically swallowed the usual stupid fundie lies. And there's lots of them. So far, he has:

(1) Confused evolution with biogenesis.
(2) Claimed that there are no intermediate forms. :cs:
(3) Passed on the usual stupid lie about Stephen Jay Gould, which the poor man has denied so often and so publicly.
(4) Maintained that "Many ancient drawings have pictures drawn of men and dinosaurs together."
(5) Asserted that evolutionary biology is founded on faith.
(6) Confounded evolutionary biology with atheism.
(7) Claimed that it would be impossible to build the pyramids with today's technology.
:dl:

He did not make up these lies himself. But he's swallowed them quite uncritically. What chance that he'll start thinking critically now?

It would have taken him literally seconds to find out about intermediate forms, or the opinion of Stephen Jay Gould, or the definition of evolution, or the large number of Christians who understand science, or how the pyramids were built --- he has the internet at his fingertips, after all --- but he couldn't be bothered. Seconds, mere seconds, to find out if he's telling the truth. But he's not that interested.

ETA: Oh great, he believes in the Loch Ness Monster as well.

[cthiax]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
Answer: He took them on the ark as the bible says he took two of every kind. Not 2 of every dog, or every horse, but kind. You have a picture of taking every species, but this is not the case. So this would limit the number of dinosaurs required. I have read that the average size of a dinosaur is a sheep, so not all dinosaurs are these massive creatures. So yes he took them and most dinosaurs are extinct.

Where did all the different kinds of dogs come from, then? Perhaps I am not understanding you...


Answer: I think "ancient" man was smarter than we give him credit for.

On this point you are absolutely correct.

Artifacts of metals are found in "primitive layers." The Egyptians built the pyramids, and what I have been told is that we couldn't do that today. Look how much we have progressed in this past century (technologically speaking only, our world is getting more and more chaotic everyday, no one can deny this, so we are certainly not better off). So I am not sure what the issue is here.

Here however you go astray. We could certainly reproduce the pyramids today. And I can indeed deny that the world is 'getting more and more chaotic every day', because that's a matter of opinion and interpretation, not fact, of course. Whether we are better off now than before depends on what you mean by better off - certainly far fewer people die of far fewer horrible diseases now, for a start. But that's another topic.

ETA that my husband read a bit of this exchange and commented, "How could we not build the pyramids today? We could FIRE THE PYRAMIDS INTO SPACE today." :D

[Nick Harman]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ossai
[b]Nick Harman
Just a quick list of questions pulled from here and elsewhere. I’ve tried to remove duplicates. The one question I really want you to answer is exactly what do you believe? Is the bible to be taken literally or figuratively or a mixed bag, and how old do you believe the earth is?

Answer: Both. Most of the bible literally. It is historical as indicated by archaeolgical records and findings. Secular writings confirm the kings talked about in the bible, etc. Context will tell whether the writing is literal or figurative. A reading in Genesis is obviously to be taken literal, it is a historical account. The only question is if it is true, not if it is figuratively speaking. And I know some Christians have comprimised and used man's opinion over the God of the universe's written word. Ask a secular Hebrew scholar if the creation days are conveyed as literal days or periods of time and he will tell you days. So the question is truth, not figurative or literal.

I’ve got a few thousand more questions once you’ve hit these high points.

The whole silly flood thing.
Where did the water come from?
Answer: Genesis 7:11 (NKJV)
In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up (inside the earth), and the windows of heaven were opened. (from above, i.e. canopy or intense global rain brought on by volcanic activity, opinions vary)

Where did the water go?
answer: you see it all over the earth: Psalm 104 refers to the mountains rising and the valleys sinking.

How many animals did Noah take on the ark?
How did they all fit on there?
How big was the ark?
answer: I addressed this to ashles, refer to that post.

Work the math for the buoyancy of the ark with and without the animals.
answer: I do not know, but the ark only needed to be a gigantic floating device not a craft built to go somewhere. Certainly not diminishing this as a simple task, but do not imagine him having to build a vessel like we see today.

Now work the math allowing only the building materials available at that time.
answer: Wood my friend, the earth was very different before the flood, bible refers to the land being gathered together. Plenty of trees. Pitch I assume as a sealant, and I have no problem believing they had the means, (hardware) to fasten together. I mentioned before we find artifacts that by evolutionary time scales should not be found.

How did the animals receive care, i.e. fed, waste removal, etc
If only ‘kinds’ were taken on the ark, name and give classifications.
answer: I wasn't there, I do not know, there are theories about design of the ark to allow for waste removal and ventilation of fumes.

If only ‘kinds’ were taken on the ark, explain how they developed species diversity afterwards at such a lightning quick pace.
answer: fast changes in species is observable. I heard ken ham talking about a darwin exibit stating about how many different species of a particular animal could arise in only 700 years. I am butchering the quote, but you get the idea.


From MRC_Hans
Parasites. How did parasites, many of which cause life-threatening diseases exist while only Adam and Eve were on Earth? Did they have all those parasites?
Answer: Death is the penalty of sin, so until Adam sinned, there was no death and disease in the world per the bible.

If yes, how did they suvive? Same during the Flood; did Noah and his family host all these parasites? (Of course, same applies to animal parasites)
Bacteria and vira. Essentially the same as parasites, but some fundies are in denial about infectuous diseases (they might, for instance, be homeopaths), so it is useful to keep micro- and macroscopic parasites separated.

Answer: Don't know. At some point we will stop discussing what I believe and we will start talking about what you believe. We have plenty of time for my beliefs for now.


Starlight: We can observe stars that are far more than 6000 LY away. How can their light reach us?
Answer: I would have to assume that light was "arrived" when God created it. This is certainly logical thinking if the bible is true.

Food-chains: This is one for ID'ers. ID'ers modify the timescale of genesis, and acknowledge that creation may have taken a very long time, but that doesn't fly; nearly all life forms are part of big ecosystems, food-chains. Miss one part of an ecosystem for any amount of time, and the whole system breaks down.

answer: I wouldn't try to defend ID's postion, (while they are getting closer) only interested in defending the word of my God, your God, buddist's God, muslims God, the Only God, whether we want to believe it or not, the God of the bible.

Serving the one and only living God,
Nick

That is all the time I have until maybe later today.

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
[
...snip...
How many animals did Noah take on the ark?

...snip...



Sorry to be persistent but I think this is important: how many of each creature did God tell Noah to take into the arc according to the Bible?

[Nick Harman]

Originally posted by Darat
Nick - that is not what the bible says.

I asked you this question a few posts ago:

How many of each creature did God tell Noah to take into the arc?

Can I suggest you go and re-read the relevant section of the Bible before you answer it?

I do not need a non believer to tell me what the bible says, I realize the bible says more than that, just did't take the time. Later today I will directly quote it to you and it will not change my answer, you are straining gnats.

In Christ,
Nick

[Ashles]

thank you for your answers.
Now don't take this the wrong way but when you are trying to explain your beliefs in a scientific way then you have to understand when we explain things to you that you are incorrect about. This is not a matter of opinion or viewpoint, some things you believe are just factually incorrect.

Originally posted by Nick Harman
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ashles
[B]Hello and welcome. You will be popular here I assure you (assuming you are a serious poster).

If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer?
Answer: Put water and dirt in a jar, shake it up and watch it work, you will not see 1 layer.
That is something completely different. In your jar example the largest and heaviest particles will sink to the bottom and the finest particles will rest on top.
This is obviously completely different to geological layers - you don't get the finest at the surface and the biggest rocks deepest underground.
It is acually quite worrying that you would try to argue these matters when your knowledge of the subject is so limited.
With that statement you have displayed a level of knowledge about geology that is pre-school level.

And why are there no dinosaurs now? Did Noah just decide not to take them?
Answer: He took them on the ark as the bible says he took two of every kind. Not 2 of every dog, or every horse, but kind. You have a picture of taking every species, but this is not the case. So this would limit the number of dinosaurs required. I have read that the average size of a dinosaur is a sheep, so not all dinosaurs are these massive creatures.
So where do all the other types of horse, dog etc. come from? All the different types have evolved? In (less than ) 6,000 years?

So yes he took them and most dinosaurs are extinct. You will scoff at this, but there are many eyewitness accounts of dinosaur like creatures. Loch Ness, Lake Champlaign, etc. Pictures of dinosaurs have been shown to tribes in relatively unexplored places like the congo and places in Africa, and they say they have seen these animals. We know of gigantic snakes. So while I am certainly not dogmatic about some dinosaurs existing today, some people and tribes would say they do in remote unexplored areas.
This is a very silly argument. No-one can make any kind of serious scientific argument that dinosaurs exist today. Loch Ness? Doesn't it worry you that your theory is on slightly shaky ground if you are resorting to using Loch Ness to back it up?
And how did these huge dinosaurs develop from sheep sized animals in such a short period of time?

Last comment on the ark is that it took over 100 years to build and God gave the dimmensions in cubits, there have been some large skeletons found, we do not know how big Noah and his son's were, how big was that cubit? Again, not scientific fact I understand, but interesting things to think about.
Not particularly interesting really.
If you read this page about the viability of the ark (http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html#building) you will see how impossible it is when you give it a certain amount of thought.

And why are there no dinosaurs and human fossils in the same geological layers (if they were all killed at the same time)?
Answer: Already mentioned intelligence, people could hold out longer, i.e. rafts, grabbing on to things and floating, etc. A dead person would float also. More factors are involved but this is one, and I do not claim to be the top authority on this or any of the matters discussed.
Firstly many dinosaurs were marine animals. I think they would hav survived better than men in water.
And dead animals float like dead people so that makes even less sense.
I believe you when you say you are not a top authority in these areas. The top authorities on these matters don't believe in the flood or the ark because it doesn't match any of the actual evidence we find.
Top authorities in the area know about geology and evolution and appreciate how they fit the known facts.

"If an animal dies and is left to lay, it will be eaten or decay and there will be nothing left of it"
That might be what you would assume, but that is not always correct.
Here's a sinmple site (http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/dinosaurs/dinofossils/Fossilhow.html) that explains how fossils form.
Answer: maybe I didn't read enough, but what I saw was talking about burial to preserve and begin depositing the minerals to start the fossilizing. I do not believe we would have as many fossils if we were limiting it to many local events.
It's not really entirely relevant to reality whther you believe this or not. It describes how fossilisation occurs.

Also, another question, if Adam and Eve gained knowledge, why were ancient people so primitive? They had stone and bone weapons and sketched crude cave paintings. Is that how Adam and Eve were when they left the garden of Eden?
Answer: I think "ancient" man was smarter than we give him credit for. Artifacts of metals are found in "primitive layers."
So why were they using bone and stone weapons? And who were these people anyway? They are not mentioned in the Bible and Noah seemed to have a pretty acceptable level of tool knowledge. Did we forget this all after Noah?
Where do they fit in?

The Egyptians built the pyramids, and what I have been told is that we couldn't do that today.
And I am telling you we could. But you will chose to believe the story that matches your belief.
What exactly do you find so difficult to acept about the pyramids? They are large regularly shaped piles of stones. Making straight lines and regularly shaped masonry, and measuing accurately are hardly unknown skills today. What aspects strike you as beyond our current ability?
Do you, for example, actually know how they constructed the pyramids?

Look how much we have progressed in this past century (technologically speaking only, our world is getting more and more chaotic everyday, no one can deny this, so we are certainly not better off). So I am not sure what the issue is here.
What do you mean by chaotic? Our world today has a level of societal complexity that is much higher which means the systems of society are much more advanced. I think you mean it is more organised.
If we lived in a society as unregulated as that even 400 years ago our social structures could not survive.
By your comparison the human body must be more 'chaotic' than a bacteria.
In the past laws were brutal, oppression was rife, sexism and racism were prolific, people died of horrible illness much younger etc.
In what way do you feel that you, sitting safe at your computer with your family and job, would have been better off years ago?
I never understand this claim.

[Darat]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
I do not need a non believer to tell me what the bible says, I realize the bible says more than that, just did't take the time. Later today I will directly quote it to you and it will not change my answer, you are straining gnats.

In Christ,
Nick

The Bible is meant to be for everyone isn't it? Are you saying that I shouldn’t read it? That I shouldn't question what I read in it? How else will your God reveal his word to me? (Don't consider those questions I'm expecting answers to.)

Anyway to the reason why I keep bringing this up. You have mentioned time and time again that God told Moses to take 2 of each creature into the Arc. But the Bible actually says something quite different:

Genesis Chapter 6 (KJV)

17 And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.

18 But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.

19 And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.

20 Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive.

21 And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.

22 Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.


So there is the "2 of each kind" yo mention, yet if we continue to read:

Genesis: Chapter 7


1 And the LORD said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.

2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female.

3 Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth


And now it has changed to seven pairs of each clean beast.

The Flood story in teh Bible is contradictory some of the ones I can remember are:

7 pairs of clean v 2 pairs of each
Noah sends out a raven v Noah sends out a dove
Flood lasts 40 days and forty nights v flood lasts a year

Even the Bible doesn’t seem to be sure of the facts of the Flood, so how can you be certain?

[Mojo]

Originally posted by Nick Harman
If a flood has killed millions of things why are their remains not all found in the same geological layer?
Answer: Put water and dirt in a jar, shake it up and watch it work, you will not see 1 layer.Actually, most of the mud will settle into a single layer. Try doing the experiment yourself. The sediment from a single flood certainly won't settle into many layers neatly arranged into a coherent order.And why are there no dinosaurs now? Did Noah just decide not to take them?
Answer: He took them on the ark as the bible says he took two of every kind. Not 2 of every dog, or every horse, but kind. You have a picture of taking every species, but this is not the case.So, if two of each species were not taken, and macro-evolution (i.e. evolution from one species to another) doesn't occur (as creationists insist), where did all the currently existing species come from?You will scoff at this, but there are many eyewitness accounts of dinosaur like creatures. Loch Ness, Lake Champlaign, etc. Pictures of dinosaurs have been shown to tribes in relatively unexplored places like the congo and places in Africa, and they say they have seen these animals. We know of gigantic snakes.Snakes are reptiles, not dinosaurs. And, since we know of gigantic snakes, and other reptiles, isn't it possible that the pictures these people were shown were mistaken for pictures of gigantic reptiles? Since no recent remains of dinosaurs have ever been found, isn't this more likely? And why are there no dinosaurs and human fossils in the same geological layers (if they were all killed at the same time)?
Answer: Already mentioned intelligence, people could hold out longer, i.e. rafts, grabbing on to things and floating, etc. A dead person would float also.Even if humans were smart enough to make rafts etc., in a major disaster such as the flood described in the Bible there would be bound to be many humans who were caught unawares, didn't have the opportunity to build a raft, etc. (Noah needed to be given considerable warning, didn't he), who would therefore have died early on in the flood. Compare with what happened in the recent tsunami. And if a dead person would float, so would a dead dino. More factors are involved but this is one, and I do not claim to be the top authority on this or any of the matters discussed.Don't worry, you