Noah's flood: global or local?

[M. Partyka]

Granted, it wasn't really "Noah's flood" -- he didn't start it, just survived it -- but that's the shortest title I could think of.

[Matthew Namee]

There's plenty of non-biblical evidence to support the idea that the Flood was a global catastrophe. In fact, you might say it is the best-documented event in the pre-Christian world. Many have written on the various ancient cultures that speak of a global flood survived by one couple or a small group in a boat, often after having been warned by a god. There are literally dozens of these stories, most of which are unconnected with each other.

Besides that, from what I have read, there is reason to believe in a global flood from a scientific standpoint as well. The sources I have found suggest sometime in the eleventh century BC.

[Nina]

Granted, it wasn't really "Noah's flood" -- he didn't start it, just survived it -- but that's the shortest title I could think of.

Of course it was global.

[M. Partyka]

Oops! You both posted before I could put up the poll. Please remember to vote!

[M. Partyka]

...from what I have read, there is reason to believe in a global flood from a scientific standpoint as well. The sources I have found suggest sometime in the eleventh century BC.Wouldn't that put Moses before the flood?

[Father David Moser]

Oops! You both posted before I could put up the poll. Please remember to vote!

Just a note - polls are a feature that has been discontinued in the Monachos discussion forum, therefore, don't wait to vote - just continue to make your comments. This could be a very interesting discussion.

Fr David Moser

[Alec Lowly]

There's plenty of non-biblical evidence to support the idea that the Flood was a global catastrophe. In fact, you might say it is the best-documented event in the pre-Christian world. Many have written on the various ancient cultures that speak of a global flood survived by one couple or a small group in a boat, often after having been warned by a god. There are literally dozens of these stories, most of which are unconnected with each other.

Besides that, from what I have read, there is reason to believe in a global flood from a scientific standpoint as well. The sources I have found suggest sometime in the eleventh century BC.


I am unaware of any physical evidence of a global flood during the time that the human race has walked this earth, so please amplify your statement that "there is reason to believe in a global flood from a scientific standpoint as well." Also, the prevalence of flood myths does not in the least support the idea that everybody is talking about the same flood. Devastating floods happen locally all the time, all over the world, therefore virtually all primitive cultures have flood myths.

[Antonios]

Does science support either side? Will it ever in my lifetime, or even before the end of time? I just don't have the knowledge or the facts.

As to whether it was local or global, I think we must understand what the flood was to the person of Noah first, even before considering its geographic magnitude. To him, it was both.

Anything else, we rely on faith.

[Rick H.]

Global Flood (http://www.globalflood.org/)

[Paul Cowan]

Global Flood

In the hill country of Texas you can find water dwelling fossils all over the place. Since there has not been an ocean this high up, how else did these fossils get there unless the water was that high up at one time. I dont know of a major evaporation period on the planet to account for that much water disappearing so it must have been something else.

Paul

[Alec Lowly]

Global Flood (http://www.globalflood.org/)

Thanks, Rick, but I do not find the arguments of the creationists at all persuasive.

[Rick H.]

Thanks, Rick, but I do not find the arguments of the creationists at all persuasive.

On the whole, I'm not that interested to be honest (and do not appreciate the 'fundyville' from which many of the creationists come from), but I heard a guy named Ken Ham from Answers in Genesis speak once who was pretty sharp and held my attention. But, the point being there is some science behind this that is credible as any.

[Antonios]

Science can't even tell us what came first, the chicken or the egg? (mistake, there are some who come from the purely poultry camp of the chickens which cowardly claim the chicken came first. Another camp of hermetic introverts insist, however, that it is the egg which came first. As we can see, the jury is still out, and to this day, humans cook both and eat'em...)

:)

[Olga]

If memory serves, Ken Ham is an Australian creationist who has been living in the US for some years now. The circumstances of his relocation to the US were somewhat controversial. He has set up the Creation Museum (which has, among its exhibits, animatronic recreations of humans living alongside dinosaurs), and is a fervent advocate of the literal interpretation of the Bible, including the Book of Genesis, and argues that the Earth is about 6000 years old (so-called "young-earth" creationism).

[Yuri Zharikov]

I am unaware of any physical evidence of a global flood during the time that the human race has walked this earth, so please amplify your statement that "there is reason to believe in a global flood from a scientific standpoint as well." Also, the prevalence of flood myths does not in the least support the idea that everybody is talking about the same flood. Devastating floods happen locally all the time, all over the world, therefore virtually all primitive cultures have flood myths.

Just a note... if something is grounded in reality, i.e. based on an event that happened, it cannot be a myth; myths have no reality behind them.

Yura

[Herman Blaydoe]

Just a note... if something is grounded in reality, i.e. based on an event that happened, it cannot be a myth; myths have no reality behind them.

Yura

I do not believe this is correct. I know that G. K. Chesterton has a much different take on the subject:


It is quite easy to see why a legend {myth} is treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of history. The legend {myth} is generally made by the majority of people in the village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in the village who is mad.

From Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton

Words in {} added by me. Myth is merely history given context.

Herman the Pooh

[Rick H.]

Science can't even tell us what came first, the chicken or the egg? (mistake, there are some who come from the purely poultry camp of the chickens which cowardly claim the chicken came first. Another camp of hermetic introverts insist, however, that it is the egg which came first. As we can see, the jury is still out, and to this day, humans cook both and eat'em...)

:)


Antonios, I wonder if you read the discussion (post #29 in the following) by the great thinkers here at monachos about why the chicken crossed the road? :)

Ode to the overuse of boldface font - Page 2 - Monachos.net Discussion Community (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?p=53982&highlight=chicken+road#post53982)

[M.C. Steenberg]

Just a note... if something is grounded in reality, i.e. based on an event that happened, it cannot be a myth; myths have no reality behind them.

No! This is a terribly secular version of 'myth'. In theology, myths convey truth.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Alec Lowly]

On the whole, I'm not that interested to be honest (and do not appreciate the 'fundyville' from which many of the creationists come from), but I heard a guy named Ken Ham from Answers in Genesis speak once who was pretty sharp and held my attention. But, the point being there is some science behind this that is credible as any.

Well, Rick, no. There is ~not~ "some science behind this that is as credible as any." Creationism is simply not credible as science, period, because it dispenses with the necessity of falsifiability. Their arguments work this way: "If I had some cheese, I could make a cheese sandwich -- if I had some bread." Once I asked a creationist where all the flood water went to -- that would have been a simply stupendous amount of water -- and he told me that it had drained off into underground caverns. Then I asked him for evidence of the existence of underground caverns of that size -- and pretty soon he was talking about something else entirely. The plain fact is, the creationists have no new evidence, none, that would overturn the scientific consensus on the age of the earth, the origin of species, etc.

[Paul Cowan]

Once I asked a creationist where all the flood water went to -- that would have been a simply stupendous amount of water -- and he told me that it had drained off into underground caverns. Then I asked him for evidence of the existence of underground caverns of that size -- and pretty soon he was talking about something else entirely.

Have you not seen the "Voyage to the center of the earth"? (sorry, just kidding)

This begs the question though...where do evolutionists say the water went? Even on a "local" scale for the ark to rest on top of Mount Arafat, that is a significant amount of water. What does "local" mean anyway?

So would evolutionists say something like, this event was local in that that which was not local was butted up against an intensly high wall of water such as in the Moses crossing the Red Sea story. And it just sort of decreased in height over time to allow the local and nonlocal water to be the same depth once again.

Paul ( I can't believe I opened myself up to this debate)

[Rick H.]

Well, Rick, no. There is ~not~ "some science behind this that is as credible as any." Creationism is simply not credible as science, period, because it dispenses with the necessity of falsifiability. Their arguments work this way: "If I had some cheese, I could make a cheese sandwich -- if I had some bread."



Alec, all things considered, I'd rather be in Philadelphia, I mean . . . I think I will defer to you on this one and go make a cheese sandwich. :)

[Olga]

... with Philadelphia cheese? (sorry!!)

[Yuri Zharikov]

... with Philadelphia cheese? (sorry!!)

i thought science was about counting beans, not eating cheese... at least this is what I have been doing till now... oops

[Matthew Namee]

Just a few things:

1) How did this turn into a creation/evolution thing? I understand that generally "creationists" would favor a global flood and "evolutionists" a local one, but I'm a "global flood" person who has no problem with evolution (with a couple important caveats). Where does that leave me?

2) Scientific evidence. Well, not being a scientist myself, I sort of opened myself up to some criticism. I do understand that there is some interesting circumstantial evidence, e.g. flash-frozen tropical animals in Siberia, or dramatic changes in sea level due to melting glaciers in the eleventh millenium BC.

3) The flood myths. I totally disagree with the notion that because there were local floods all over the world, the numerous flood legends are all worthless as evidence. For one, the legends all have very, very, very similar elements, too many to be merely coincidental. Man and wife are warned by a god to get into a boat and ride out a storm that will wipe out the rest of humanity (or most of humanity). They bring animals and plants and so forth into the boat with them. Etc. I could dig through my boxes of books and find some direct quotations, but honestly, I don't have time at the moment. I am sure you could find many of these online. I know that the controversial writer Graham Hancock has addressed them in one of his books, and he's as far from being a Christian as anyone. But he's far from the only one, and he's a bad example because he's so controversial. Legitimate scholars have also dealt with the global flood myths. More than anything else, I find the prevalence of these myths to be convincing evidence of a global flood.

4) Can I make a brief response on behalf of Orthodox who are uncomfortable with evolution? It seems to me that the most Orthodox critique of evolution is this: the overwhelming majority of the Fathers present a view of the origins of mankind which is in stark contrast to evolution; indeed, in many cases impossible to reconcile. For people who are deeply indebted to and aware of tradition, it is very difficult for us Orthodox to simply say that all of these great Fathers were wrong. I know that there are many other issues and objections, but to me, this is the best and most important one. Personally, I see the objection and still don't have a problem with evolution (with some caveats, as I said before), but I definitely respect my fellow Orthodox Christians who are on the other side of the issue.

[Yuri Zharikov]

Personally, I see the objection and still don't have a problem with evolution (with some caveats, as I said before), but I definitely respect my fellow Orthodox Christians who are on the other side of the issue.

Which is?... not to see the objection or not to have a problem with "evolution"?

[Yuri Zharikov]

No! This is a terribly secular version of 'myth'. In theology, myths convey truth.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

I guess I meant it in the strictly secular, or better put, anti-Christian sense.

[Yuri Zharikov]

Their arguments work this way: "If I had some cheese, I could make a cheese sandwich -- if I had some bread." Once I asked a creationist ...
.

This is classic... once I asked a former fellow Uni student who was doing his PhD at the time about his take on the origin of life. His response was along the lines, that if we ignored the second law of thermodynamics and the fact that biological molecules cannot be produced abiogenically, and if we had 5 (4.5, 6, 10, 15 make your pick) billion years and also did not worry about statistical probability, then we should have no problem believing that a single tiny cell could evolve. Everything else would then evolve from that cell.

Or I could say: If I was a monkey with a computer in my head, I could evolve from a monkey - if somebody could stick a computer in its head.

in the Lord,
Yura

[Alec Lowly]

Have you not seen the "Voyage to the center of the earth"? (sorry, just kidding)

This begs the question though...where do evolutionists say the water went? Even on a "local" scale for the ark to rest on top of Mount Arafat, that is a significant amount of water. What does "local" mean anyway?

So would evolutionists say something like, this event was local in that that which was not local was butted up against an intensly high wall of water such as in the Moses crossing the Red Sea story. And it just sort of decreased in height over time to allow the local and nonlocal water to be the same depth once again.

Paul ( I can't believe I opened myself up to this debate)

I have no idea what "evolutionists" would say, but geologists would confirm that there's ample evidence of major floods devastating the Mesopotamian plain (the land between the Tigris and the Euphrates) dating back to prehistoric times. And whatever is up there on Mount Ararat, nobody can say exactly what, so let's wait for hard evidence before concluding it's Noah's Ark ...

[M. Partyka]

Global Flood (http://www.globalflood.org/)Hmm...I'm not sure how anybody else would deal with having a whole web site thrown at him/her. I suppose it would be fair to throw an opposing one right back, but I'd rather not.

Instead, why don't we look at a particular statement from the home page of this particular web site and see whether or not it sounds agreeable from a scientific standpoint? Here is Dr. John Baumgardner's opinion on the flood and how the fossil and geological evidence should be interpreted in light of the flood:


The Bible...describes a point in time when God catastrophically destroyed the earth with essentially all its life. The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event described so vividly in the Biblical texts is to understand that the fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global cataclysm that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year. This Biblical interpretation of the rock record implies the animals and plants preserved as fossils were all contemporaries, all living on earth at the same time prior to the cataclysm. This means trilobites, dinosaurs, and mammals all dwelled on the planet at once, and they all perished together in this world-destroying cataclysm.Here are the "factual" statements I can gather from the above quote:

1) The flood was global.

2) The flood occurred within the last 6000 years. (This puts it within the usual Young Earth Creationist boundaries.)

3) The flood lasted for one whole year.

4) When God flooded the earth, he destroyed all life on earth save that which was preserved in Noah's ark. (Question: Does this include plant life? What about fish, both freshwater and saltwater varieties?)

5) All fossils in existence, both plant and animal alike, were created during the flood year. Therefore, all the plants and animals preserved in the fossil record were in existence on earth a few thousand years ago when the flood began.

If it appears that I've misinterpreted Dr. Baumgardner's conclusions, please speak up.

The first thing that immediately strikes me about these five points is how the last point doesn't really follow from the first four. Is it really necessary that all fossils were produced during the flood? Certainly, this must be true if one holds to a young-earth creationist position, but are those who grant that the earth may very well be millions, if not billions, of years old bound to insist that all fossils are products of the flood? I would think not.

[Rick H.]

Hmm...I'm not sure how anybody else would deal with having a whole web site thrown at him/her.




I guess it depends on one's degree of genuine interest in the topic.

As for me, I'll stick with the W.C. Fields quote mentioned above, and look forward to some steak with my philly cheese on my next sandwich.

[Nina]

look forward to some steak with my philly cheese on my next sandwich.

:D Yeah have a feast until Lent starts. Actually this week is fast-free.

[Herman Blaydoe]

If, somehow, some sort of indisputable evidence were to be produced that proved that the flood of Noah was merely a local phenomenon, would that change your faith?

It wouldn't affect mine. I don't think it matters all that much, but hey, that's just me.

Herman the Pooh

[Silouan Howard]

I was reading this in the epistle for today and thought of this thread. How do you all think this verse contributes to the argument at hand?

starting with v. 5

"For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded by water."

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I was reading this in the epistle for today and thought of this thread. How do you all think this verse contributes to the argument at hand?

starting with v. 5

"For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded by water."

In the last part of these two verses the Flood is what is being referred to.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Silouan Howard]

In the last part of these two verses the Flood is what is being referred to.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Right..but what is interesting is the part that says "the world that then existed". What is this referring to? The known world or the actual world?

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Right..but what is interesting is the part that says "the world that then existed". What is this referring to? The known world or the actual world?

I think that this refers to the world that existed before the Flood.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Antonios]

I guess it can be confusing because the term 'world' sometimes does not exactly refer to the planet earth, per se. In modern parlance, it sometimes refers to all of creation (the entire universe, etc.), and other times, it is used very relativistically. Was this flexibility in terminology similar with the term used in the Hebrew Bible and Septuagant?

[Owen Jones]

It would be good to know the original Greek word that is used. Is it cosmos, or aeon? Aeon can refer to world either as time or space. So what I perceive here is that, theologically, God is wiping out all that has transpired heretofore regarding man's sinfulness, not just as retribution, but so that mankind can make a fresh start without the legacy and burden of sin. But we quickly see that this does not work. One theory of course is that theology is a post hoc interpretation of natural events and phenomena. I would not take this too far, but clearly we see how this happens in our personal lives today -- we do this all the time -- and so it would be true for our ancestors. I say we do this all the time, meaning that we typically apply a theological interpretation to personal events. Of course, our belief is that this interpretation is of the Holy Spirit, which cannot be separated from the event itself. The flood is "global" therefore, in that it is perceived to be a universal solution to the problem of sin and corruption that has affected everyone and everything. I think a naturalistic approach to it obscures the theological significance.

I must say that I am intrigued by the link posted above about the current state of science as to the validity of carbon dating. There is a certain tone to the web site that is questionable, however, so it would be interesting to see some independent survey of the current state of science that the web site claims, regarding the theory that radiological deterioration is not a steady process but is effected by natural cataclysmic events.

[Owen Jones]

This seems to be the argument: due to the much more accurate measurements afforded by accelerator mass spectrometry, carbon 14 can be determined in samples rather than deducing it from measuring the rate of decay over time. The results of such sampling show certain anomalies. First, in organic samples, the longest dating is under 100,000 years. That is to say, they are finding trace evidence of carbon 14 in all organic samples, regardless of the geological layer, whereas, according to the theory of a constant decay over time, the samples from the older layers should not have any detectable carbon 14 remaining. This anomaly is attributed to some kind of unexplained, inherent contamination. The counter theory, as best I can understand the argument so far, is that either there is no organic compound that existed prior to 100,000 years ago, or that there is a fallacy to the constant rate theory, or some combination of the two. The author argues that the constant rate theory is false, and that some geological cataclysm, comparatively recently, affected the carbon 14 content of compounds. In checking some other web sites I confirmed that the theory of contamination not only is attributed to earth samples, but also to meteororites!!!

Hopefully there is more written on this subject than I have seen so far, but if the theory of an earth that is many billions of years old, and organic matter that is hundreds of millions of years old, is undermined by new technologies, then, of course, the whole naturalistic, evolutionary theory completely evaporates. But we are talking here about a global flood, and I have not yet quite understood the theory regarding impact a global cataclysm has on carbon 14 dating. Help????

[M. Partyka]

The flood is "global" therefore, in that it is perceived to be a universal solution to the problem of sin and corruption that has affected everyone and everything. I think a naturalistic approach to it obscures the theological significance.This is interesting, because initially the responses I was getting were more along the lines of an unqualified "global" (i.e., the whole world was covered in water, and all animal life outside the ark died). Now the discussion is moving toward the "local, but still 'global' in a sense" part of the spectrum, and I wonder how comfortable everyone here is with that. Is there anybody who thinks that going from "global" to "local but in a way global" is sufficiently contrary to the clear meaning of Scripture as to rule out any sort of "local" explanation?

Also, the quote from 2 Peter 3 brought to mind this quote from 1 Peter 3:18-22:


For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. There is also an antitype which now saves us -- baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers having been made subject to Him.

It seems to me that this quote offers up a somewhat literalist yet also somewhat analogical view of the flood: literalist in that "eight souls were saved", yet analogical in that this salvation "through water" typifies baptism. Given that this whole passage is considered divinely inspired, however, can we safely downplay the literalism and deem the analogical aspect "the important thing"?

With regard to carbon-14 dating, it should be kept in mind that while C-14 dating is only accurate to within 50,000 years (last I heard), that still implies that the world is 40,000 years older than most young-earth creationists allow. True, this would make the earth young enough to disprove evolution, but as was astutely pointed out earlier, evolution isn't the issue at hand. I would suggest, then, that even if C-14 dating is conclusively shown to be inaccurate past 50,000 years, this only leads us to two more questions:

1) Has there been a truly global flood in the last 50,000 years?
2) If not, is there any evidence besides C-14 dating which would lead us to believe that the earth is much older than 50,000 years (and that perhaps a truly global flood such as that recorded in Genesis happened more than 50,000 years ago)?


If, somehow, some sort of indisputable evidence were to be produced that proved that the flood of Noah was merely a local phenomenon, would that change your faith? It wouldn't affect mine. I don't think it matters all that much, but hey, that's just me.This is a good question, and I don't think I've seen anyone address it yet. It's on account of this sort of question that I initially provided more than just "global" and "local" as possible answers. I wanted to give everybody various "degrees of distance" away from the plain meaning of the text, not just an "accept/deny" sort of position. For example, if the flood was local, but some land animals outside the ark not in the area of the flood survived, is that still "okay"? What if there were human survivors outside the flood area? What if there's really no historicity to the flood story at all, and the important elements of the story are really the theological elements it conveys? I suspect different people will have different levels of comfort with each possible option. (That's what made the poll aspect so appealing -- easier to track people's answers -- but, oh, well. No biggie.)

[Owen Jones]

Let me clarify that by focusing on the typological, this does not refute or negate the literal/historical. And as any amateur naturalist knows, there is evidence of the sea having flooded the earth to relatively high altitudes at one point.

In one of the websites I read, the dating of carbon 14 is estimated to be + or - 50 years, not 50,000 years. They know with exactness the half life. One thing I ran across in my very cursory survey is that carbon 14 is a product of the effect of cosmic rays on stable carbon compounds. I didn't know that.

But I am having some difficulty understanding how a cataclysmic tectonic shift causing a global flood would have radically altered the rate of carbon 14 decay, thus throwing into doubt the foundational theory of carbon dating, that the rate of decay is a constant.

[Alec Lowly]

With some trepidation, I really must point out that creationist defenses of a literal Genesis betoken an evangelical Protestant phronema, not an Orthodox phronema ... and a distinctively American Protestant phronema, at that ... "The scriptures were written to show us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go" (Augustine of Hippo) ...

[M. Partyka]

...as any amateur naturalist knows, there is evidence of the sea having flooded the earth to relatively high altitudes at one point.Perhaps in this or that area, but all the earth at once? And in what geological timeframe?


In one of the websites I read, the dating of carbon 14 is estimated to be + or - 50 years, not 50,000 years. They know with exactness the half life.I wasn't talking about the half-life (which probably is 50 years, like you've said). I was talking about how far back in time carbon-14 dating is considered to be relatively accurate. If, for example, carbon-14 dating is only accurate going back 50,000 years, then I expect there must be other arguments propping up the more common belief in a 3 to 4 billion year old earth.


But I am having some difficulty understanding how a cataclysmic tectonic shift causing a global flood would have radically altered the rate of carbon 14 decay, thus throwing into doubt the foundational theory of carbon dating, that the rate of decay is a constant.A tectonic shift wouldn't have anything to do with radioactive decay rates from a naturalistic perspective. Supernatural causes are usually invoked when a change in radioactive decay is posited.

[M. Partyka]

With some trepidation, I really must point out that creationist defenses of a literal Genesis betoken an evangelical Protestant phronema, not an Orthodox phronema ... and a distinctively American Protestant phronema, at that ... "The scriptures were written to show us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go" (Augustine of Hippo) ...I think this speaks to the question which was asked earlier (and still waits to be addressed) about, "How would it affect your faith if, regarding the flood, <such-and-such> turned out to be true only 'in a sense' rather than true as literally stated (in addition to being true 'in a sense')?"

[Herman Blaydoe]

I think this speaks to the question which was asked earlier (and still waits to be addressed) about, "How would it affect your faith if, regarding the flood, <such-and-such> turned out to be true only 'in a sense' rather than true as literally stated (in addition to being true 'in a sense')?"

For me the only thing that would destroy my faith would be some sort of incontrovertible proof that Christ did not rise from the dead, since as St. Paul says:

1 Corinthians 15:17-19 And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins! Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.

[M. Partyka]

For me the only thing that would destroy my faith would be some sort of incontrovertible proof that Christ did not rise from the dead....Let's play pretend for a moment. What if somehow it were incontrovertibly proven that the miracle in which Christ fed the five thousand with a few loaves and fishes never took place?

[Michael Stickles]

A tectonic shift wouldn't have anything to do with radioactive decay rates from a naturalistic perspective. Supernatural causes are usually invoked when a change in radioactive decay is posited.

Actually, I've seen plenty of discussions of the idea that radioactive decay rates can vary with natural causes, such as large cosmic radiation influx, large pressure differences, etc. The discussions can pretty much be broken up into two groups:

(1) It is well established that radioactive decay rates can vary due to natural causes;
(2) There is no evidence that radioactive decay rates can vary significantly due to natural causes.

I haven't found it worth my time to dig in and see who's more likely to be right.

Mike

[Alec Lowly]

Let's play pretend for a moment. What if somehow it were incontrovertibly proven that the miracle in which Christ fed the five thousand with a few loaves and fishes never took place?


An interesting choice of miracles, M. Partyka ... because it is recorded in all four gospels, the critics, by virtue of their own discipline, would have to concede that, well, ~something~ must have happened ... but if it could be proven that this miracle never happened, I would want to know, first, if the reports of this miracle are deliberate frauds ... if not, then what are we talking about ... ultimately, however, my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God and the only saviour of men is not based on any written document, even inspired scripture ... my ultimate faith is in the Word made flesh, not the Word made words ...

[Matthew Namee]

First of all, I'm perfectly open to the idea that the Flood might have been only a local phenomenon. I do believe it was truly global, but I'm open to being wrong.

As for my belief in Christ, it is based on indemonstrable faith, as I believe St. Clement of Alexandria put it. It's not based on some experience I've had or some text I've read. I cannot even conceive of what "incontrovertible proof" even means. Can anything be incontrovertibly proven? All "fact" is based on perception; absolutes exist, but it is impossible for humans to truly view anything "objectively." So I would consider the answer to be "null," something like zero divided by zero. Neither, however, can the truth of Christ be "incontrovertibly proven." It is ultimately based on faith, the first principle, or else it is based on something else which becomes our first principle, ad infinitum. In any event, the Genesis Flood is largely irrelevant to the more crucial matter of faith in Jesus Christ.

[Antonios]

I think you'll find that most Christians here would say that if we based our faith according to reason or science, then we would have rather chosen to become scientific explorers trying to find the 'fountain of youth'. Or perhaps bankers enjoying weekend trips with their yachts. Instead, our charge is one of sacrifice and works of repentance, begging the Lord for the same mercy He showed to his beloved servant Noah. As servants of our Master and Lord Jesus Christ, Noah is our brother, a sole survivor in all of God's good creation, and we pray for his intercessions before the Throne of Christ.

When we begin to shape our faith with what current scientific data propose, then we also begin to rely on Venn diagrams and pharmaceutical drugs to save us, when it is Jesus Christ Who does. Was the flood global? Was it only local? I don't know. Lord have mercy on me, a sinner, who never would have seen the ark...

[M. Partyka]

...ultimately, however, my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God and the only saviour of men is not based on any written document, even inspired scripture...my ultimate faith is in the Word made flesh, not the Word made words...
As for my belief in Christ, it is based on indemonstrable faith....It's not based on some experience I've had or some text I've read....It is ultimately based on faith, the first principle, or else it is based on something else which becomes our first principle, ad infinitum.What I find interesting about these kinds of responses is the epistemological question they immediately raise: From where do our beliefs originate, or perhaps it's better put, how do we know what we know?

I personally think belief is the result of one of two ultimate sources: personal experience or trusted authority. Yet, responses like the ones above seem to reject both sources of knowledge, which leaves...what, exactly? If what you believe isn't founded upon your own personal experience or the account of a trusted authority, what is it based upon? If you reply, "Upon Christ Himself," you're being disingenuous, aren't you? Because what you're really saying is either (1) you've had a personal experience involving Christ or (2) you've believed what somebody else has told you (audibly or in writing) about Christ -- probably a mixture of both, I think most people would say.

According to St. Paul, faith isn't an irreducible first principle. Rather, "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Rom 10:17) "Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?...He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" (Gal 3:2,5) Before you can believe, you must have something to believe in, right? And from where do you get that something? Either from personal experience or from a trusted authority, I would argue -- unless there's some third source I'm overlooking.

[Herman Blaydoe]

From where do our beliefs originate, or perhaps it's better put, how do we know what we know? ... I personally think belief is the result of one of two ultimate sources: personal experience or trusted authority.

How about both?

Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”

First we are told, then we encounter for ourselves.

[Owen Jones]

Back to the flood, and the web site cited. My impression is that the accuracy of carbon dating, especially through AMS spectrometry, is not questioned by the author. What he points out, as I understand him, is that there are no organic compounds that have been dated as having existed for more than 90,000 years or so. The scientists conducting the spectrometry attribute this to contamination of the samples. But he argues that after every known method of eliminating contamination, they still get the same results. I see nothing to suggest he is arguing that carbon dating is not accurate prior to 50,000 years. He says that if organic compounds were much, much older, they would get a carbon 14 reading of zero. But in all of the organic compounds being tested, they all show the presence of carbon 14. Therefore, all of the animals in the fossil record must have existed contemporaneously, he argues, and must have died at the same time due to some global cataclysm. He attributes this to the flood, (albeit, not 6,000 years ago). The fact that rocks date much much older he argues is due to his theory that the rate of carbon 14 decay is not a constant, that there was a dramatic shift during this tectonic catastrophe. That's where he loses me. But even if inorganic matter is much, much older, if there is a sound scientific argument that the anomalies in carbon 14 dating are not due to contamination, but actual proof that organic compounds have not been around longer than 90,000 years, this would destroy evolutionary theory. In any case, creationism often argues the wrong point, because Darwinism is not, and cannot ever be a theory of origins. It never attempts to explain why anything should exist at all. And if there is only a materialistic causality, they never deal with the problem of infinite regression, which is irrational.

[Owen Jones]

This is a summary from Dr. Baumgartner's web site. According to his bio, he has been at Los Alamos since 1988.

The online home of Dr. John Baumgardner's
work related to the Genesis flood.


MOST RECENT

Dr. Baumgardner
will be presenting the following papers during the 2003 International Conference on Creationism

Carbon 14

Catastrophic Plate Tectonics



(28 July 03) What conceivable mechanism could have produced the vast geological transformation of the earth evident all around us in a single year-long Flood event? Answering this question correctly has been a major focus of mine for the past 25 years.

My conclusion is that the Flood was one facet of a larger global-scale tectonic cataclysm. A key aspect of this catastrophe was the rapid sinking, in conveyor belt fashion, of the pre-Flood ocean tectonic plates into the earth's interior. The energy required for the process was derived from the earth's gravity acting on the excess weight of these cold ocean plates relative to the hotter and less dense mantle rock into which they slid. Decades of laboratory experiments attest to the fact that, under stress, mantle rock, at temperatures estimated for the earth's interior, can weaken by factors of billions or more. My work on this problem has primarily involved computer experiments that apply the properties of silicate rock, as measured in these laboratory experiments, to the setting of the earth's mantle. These calculations demonstrate that a catastrophic instability can indeed occur in a planet with the size and structure of the earth. This mechanism for the Flood cataclysm has become known as catastrophic plate tectonics. My latest modeling results are described in a paper presented at the Fifth International Conference on Creationism in August 2003.

The purpose of this website is to collect into one place
(1) a selection of the massive evidence that supports the reality of the Biblical Flood,
(2) a clear description of a tectonic mechanism for this cataclysm as well as current modeling results, and
(3) a collection of related materials that provide some of the context of the broader debate in which the issue of the Flood is only one facet.

It is true that evolutionists generally feel secure today, even in the face of compelling creationist arguments, because of their utter confidence in the geological time scale. Even if they cannot provide a naturalistic mechanism for macroevolution, they appeal to the 'fact of evolution,' by which they mean an interpretation of earth history in which they believe there has been a succession of different types of plants and animals in a drama spanning many hundreds of millions of years. The Bible, by contrast, paints a radically different picture of our planet's history. In particular, it describes a point in time when God catastrophically destroyed the earth with essentially all its life. The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event described so vividly in the Biblical texts is to understand that the fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global cataclysm that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year. This Biblical interpretation of the rock record implies the animals and plants preserved as fossils were all contemporaries, all living on earth at the same time prior to the cataclysm. This means trilobites, dinosaurs, and mammals all dwelled on the planet at once, and they all perished together in this world-destroying cataclysm. Since the time scale is such a key issue in the interpretation of the geological record, this site also gives considerable emphasis to compelling new radioisotope evidence for the planet's young age.

(More about radioisotopes and the age of the earth)

[Matthew Namee]

What I find interesting about these kinds of responses is the epistemological question they immediately raise: From where do our beliefs originate, or perhaps it's better put, how do we know what we know?
I'd like to respond to that with St. Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, Book VIII, Chapter 3):

"In point of fact, the philosophers admit that the first principles of all things are indemonstrable. So that if there is demonstration at all, there is an absolute necessity that there be something that is self-evident, which is called primary and indemonstrable. Consequently all demonstration is traced up to indemonstrable faith."

Everything, excepting first principles, is based on something else. Without first principles, we would fall into infinite regress. Both personal experience and trusted testimony can be - and often are - challenged. Only faith which is itself the first principle, based upon nothing else, is unable to be overcome.

This is why I am always amazed at questions like, "If someone could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Christ did not rise from the dead, would your faith be shaken?" Such a position places far, far too much emphasis on the faculty of reason -- an emphasis which I would contend is foreign to the mind of the Orthodox Church. Did not Christ say, "Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:3)? The author of Hebrews writes, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Heb 11:1). Faith is its own evidence, and as such, it is not shaken by various and sundry claims and "proofs," since it is not based upon claims and proofs to begin with.

[M. Partyka]

Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”

First we are told, then we encounter for ourselves.I agree with you because these are the two sources of belief I mentioned: (1) Hearing or reading a trusted authority and (2) personal experience. Yet it was these two sources which were being denied above, especially in this quote:


As for my belief in Christ, it is based on indemonstrable faith....It's not based on some experience I've had or some text I've read....My question is, if you deny personal experience and/or the testimony of a trusted authority as the sources upon which you base your beliefs, what's left?

[M. Partyka]

My impression is that the accuracy of carbon dating, especially through AMS spectrometry, is not questioned by the author. What he points out, as I understand him, is that there are no organic compounds that have been dated as having existed for more than 90,000 years or so....I see what you're saying, but I still think it's important to note that scientists have validated the accuracy of C-14 dating back to 50,000 years. (See the research paper at http://ijolite.geology.uiuc.edu/02FallClass/geo433/papers/14C_%20production.pdf.) That means the earth is at least 40,000 years older than most young earth creationists (such as Dr. Baumgardner himself) would allow. (Actually, the paper suggests that the earth is at least 100,000 years old based on annual varve deposits in Japan's Lake Suigetsu.)

It's also noteworthy that there is no catastrophic break recorded in any of the calibrative methods used to corroborate C-14 dating (e.g., varves, tree rings) occurring within the "few thousand years ago" that Dr. Baumgardner allows for the date of the global flood. Judging from the evidence, either we must conclude that Dr. Baumgardner is incorrect and the flood occurred earlier than 50,000-100,000 years ago, or we must accept (and hopefully prove) Dr. Baumgardner's assertion that all of the geological evidence we're looking at actually was laid down during the global flood -- i.e., we're wrongly interpreting the evidence.

But the latter possibility, that 100,000 varves were laid down in Lake Suigetsu is not just improbable -- it's impossible because of the way those varves are formed: once every year, algae bloom and then decay into a white layer at the bottom of the lake, which is then covered by darker sediment over the course of the following year, and the cycle repeats itself year after year. You can posit whatever flood dynamics you want, but you can't make the algae bloom more than once a year, which means that each of the 100,000 white layers in Lake Suigetsu represents approximately a one-year span of time. In short, a record of 100,000 layers of yearly algae bloom requires roughly 100,000 years to produce. If we have the record -- and we do -- then there must have been sufficient time for the earth to have naturally produced it.

Going back to the statements made on Dr. Baumgardner's web site's home page, then (apologies for the formatting errors):


1) The flood was global.

2) The flood occurred within the last 6000 years. (This puts it within the usual Young Earth Creationist boundaries.).
3) The flood lasted for one whole year.
4) When God flooded the earth, he destroyed all life on earth save that which was preserved in Noah's ark. (Question: Does this include plant life? What about fish, both freshwater and saltwater varieties?)
5) All fossils in existence, both plant and animal alike, were created during the flood year. Therefore, all the plants and animals preserved in the fossil record were in existence on earth a few thousand years ago when the flood began.Statements 2 and 5 have clearly and certainly been falsified by the evidence. That leaves us with:

1) The flood was global.
3) The flood lasted for one whole year.
4) When God flooded the earth, he destroyed all land-based life on earth save that which was preserved in Noah's ark.

This all conforms perfectly with the story of the flood in Genesis, but does in conform to the geological and fossil evidence? This is what we have yet to determine.

[Michael Stickles]

The fact that rocks date much much older he argues is due to his theory that the rate of carbon 14 decay is not a constant, that there was a dramatic shift during this tectonic catastrophe. That's where he loses me.

After going back through that, it looks like what he's saying is that all rates of radioactive decay are not constant. He postulates that the long-half-life isotopes like U238, Rb87 and K40 underwent drastically accelerated decay rates both during creation and during the flood, which makes the ages calculated using those isotopes way too big. I think he also assumes that C14 decay was greatly accelerated, but since he also postulates that the C14/C ratio was much smaller right after creation - and also underwent an increase through C->C14 generation via cosmic rays -- the resulting difference in C14 levels is within his uncertainty as to pre-Flood C14 levels.

What he doesn't provide (unless I completely missed it) is any proposed mechanism for super-acceleration of radioisotope decay rates. If a mechanism could be identified and accelerated radioisotope decay could be reproduced experimentally, then he might be on to something worth investigating.

Mike

[M. Partyka]

Both personal experience and trusted testimony can be - and often are - challenged. Only faith which is itself the first principle, based upon nothing else, is unable to be overcome.But faith in what? That's what I'm asking here. If you're not basing your faith on either personal experience or trusted testimony, what is your basis for faith?


This is why I am always amazed at questions like, "If someone could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Christ did not rise from the dead, would your faith be shaken?" Such a position places far, far too much emphasis on the faculty of reason -- an emphasis which I would contend is foreign to the mind of the Orthodox Church.But it's a valid question, to which I would suggest that any sane Christian would have to answer, "Yes, absolutely, because if Christ didn't rise from the dead, then everything I believe is based on a lie!" Now, you could also respond that there is no way one could reasonably prove that Christ did not rise from the dead, but that's avoiding the question rather than answering it.


Did not Christ say, "Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:3)?How does this verse have bearing on the question of epistemology? All this means is that children tend to accept what they're told by their parents without question because they trust their parents to do what's best for them. And why do they trust this? Usually because that's been their experience up to that point. However, if a child experiences abuse up to that point, he or she will not have that trust because that trust hasn't been formed through the child's personal experience of loving parental behavior.


The author of Hebrews writes, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Heb 11:1). Faith is its own evidence, and as such, it is not shaken by various and sundry claims and "proofs," since it is not based upon claims and proofs to begin with.I'm sorry, but it really sounds to me like you're talking nonsense here. Faith is nothing without an object of faith. What is that object of faith, and through what means have you come to know that object of faith?

[Andrew]

I'm sorry, but it really sounds to me like you're talking nonsense here. Faith is nothing without an object of faith. What is that object of faith, and through what means have you come to know that object of faith?

Radiowaves pass through your body without you having any tangible experience of them. But a radio is able to pick them up. The same is with perception of God, and communion with Christ. He is there, and by grace our hearts are opened to know Him to varying degrees, an ontological knowledge, not a mere psychological knowledge. If you have not personally experienced this faculty of the heart, then you have no ability to comment on it as one ignorant. And it is ludicrous to try to get someone to explain the mysteries of the heart in language that is not compatible with it, just as it is hard to describe color to someone who is blind.

[Rick H.]

And it is ludicrous to try to get someone to explain the mysteries of the heart in language that is not compatible with it, just as it is hard to describe color to someone who is blind.




Good point Andrew! Yes, once again here we see the problem of "language/speech" as we attempt to communicate such things as color to someone who is blind.

[Alec Lowly]

What I find interesting about these kinds of responses is the epistemological question they immediately raise: From where do our beliefs originate, or perhaps it's better put, how do we know what we know?

I personally think belief is the result of one of two ultimate sources: personal experience or trusted authority ...

Well, given these choices, then personal experience, in my own case, which is what induced me consequently to "trust" the authority ...

[Alec Lowly]

Back to the flood, and the web site cited. My impression is that the accuracy of carbon dating, especially through AMS spectrometry, is not questioned by the author. What he points out, as I understand him, is that there are no organic compounds that have been dated as having existed for more than 90,000 years or so. The scientists conducting the spectrometry attribute this to contamination of the samples. But he argues that after every known method of eliminating contamination, they still get the same results. I see nothing to suggest he is arguing that carbon dating is not accurate prior to 50,000 years. He says that if organic compounds were much, much older, they would get a carbon 14 reading of zero. But in all of the organic compounds being tested, they all show the presence of carbon 14. Therefore, all of the animals in the fossil record must have existed contemporaneously, he argues, and must have died at the same time due to some global cataclysm. He attributes this to the flood, (albeit, not 6,000 years ago). The fact that rocks date much much older he argues is due to his theory that the rate of carbon 14 decay is not a constant, that there was a dramatic shift during this tectonic catastrophe. That's where he loses me. But even if inorganic matter is much, much older, if there is a sound scientific argument that the anomalies in carbon 14 dating are not due to contamination, but actual proof that organic compounds have not been around longer than 90,000 years, this would destroy evolutionary theory. In any case, creationism often argues the wrong point, because Darwinism is not, and cannot ever be a theory of origins. It never attempts to explain why anything should exist at all. And if there is only a materialistic causality, they never deal with the problem of infinite regression, which is irrational.

If the entire human race aside from Noah's family perished, oh, 4000 BC, how then do we account for the dispersion of humanity, in various races, all over the globe, including the Western hemisphere and Australia, in so short a time? How do we account for the genetic evidence, which kicks us back 100,000 years ago to sub-Saharan Africa?

[M. Partyka]

Well, given these choices, then personal experience, in my own case, which is what induced me consequently to "trust" the authority ...FYI everybody...to separate out the question of epistemology from this "Noah's flood" thread, I've created a new thread under "Tradition, Scripture, Intellect, and Experience" called:

Epistemology -- how do you know what you know?

[Michael Stickles]

If the entire human race aside from Noah's family perished, oh, 4000 BC, how then do we account for the dispersion of humanity, in various races, all over the globe, including the Western hemisphere and Australia, in so short a time? How do we account for the genetic evidence, which kicks us back 100,000 years ago to sub-Saharan Africa?

Well, with an average of 3 children per couple surviving to adulthood, you could get from 3 couples of childbearing age all the way to a population of 3 billion in about 1500 years; make it 4 kids per couple, and you could get there in about 1000 years. Dispersing peoples all over the globe in that same time frame seems quite reasonable, even if you don't run the population anywhere near that high.

As for the genetic evidence for mankind's origins, I thought they had pushed that back to about a million years ago. Or was it 1.5 million? It's too easy to lose track of what's currently considered "indisputable". And the assumptions which go into those numbers aren't always obvious.

By the way, I'm not trying to defend the 4000BC flood idea. I do think the folks who push that view have some interesting points, but they seem to grab far more things out of thin air to support their theories than the "traditional" scientists do. I don't, though, think that the first part of your argument brings much to bear against the young-earth view. Whether the second part does depends on how valid the assumptions are that go into it, which I don't really have the background to comment on.

I tend to go along with C.S. Lewis in these areas - regardless of whether science seems to be supporting or opposing what you believe, it's best to just treat it with a "that's interesting", because science can easily change it's collective mind in a short period of time.

Mike

[Matthew Namee]

But faith in what? That's what I'm asking here. If you're not basing your faith on either personal experience or trusted testimony, what is your basis for faith?
Faith is in Christ, his cross and resurrection. There is a difference between the object of faith and the basis of faith. The object is that in which we have faith: Christ. The basis is the foundation upon which that faith is built, or the source of that faith. My faith is not based on anything. It is, as St. Clement said, the indemonstrable first principle. Otherwise, it is based on something else, and that on which it is based is higher than the faith itself. What, if I may ask, is your faith based on? You suggest experience and testimony. But what are those based on? Your own perceptions, historical evidence, surviving texts, etc., no? All of those things are supremely fallible. And what are those based on? And so forth.


But it's a valid question, to which I would suggest that any sane Christian would have to answer, "Yes, absolutely, because if Christ didn't rise from the dead, then everything I believe is based on a lie!" Now, you could also respond that there is no way one could reasonably prove that Christ did not rise from the dead, but that's avoiding the question rather than answering it.
I do not agree that it is a valid question for an Orthodox Christian. Can you prove your own existence beyond any doubt? Perhaps beyond a reasonable doubt, yes, but not beyond any doubt at all. There are people on this earth who see and hear things which do not exist. Amputees can "feel" limbs which have been cut off, yet their "experience" is not an accurate barometer of reality. Our conception of reality is based upon our willingness to accept the probability that what we think we see is in fact real. Likewise with testimony: we are trusting in the legitimacy of the evidence which survives, but how do we truly know that said evidence is reliable? We don't: we accept the high probability that it is reliable. The very concept of "fact" is actually a conclusion based upon evidence and presuppositions. Maybe the presuppositions are reasonable, but they themselves are not demonstrable. Can you prove, truly prove, that the keyboard on which you type actually exists? I challenge you to do so. Do you see what I am trying to speak of, these first principles? Faith is the first principle for the Christian believer, and it therefore cannot be demonstrated by anything else, since nothing else is higher than it.


How does this verse have bearing on the question of epistemology? All this means is that children tend to accept what they're told by their parents without question because they trust their parents to do what's best for them. And why do they trust this? Usually because that's been their experience up to that point. However, if a child experiences abuse up to that point, he or she will not have that trust because that trust hasn't been formed through the child's personal experience of loving parental behavior.
Take for instance an infant. No, better, take a zygote, which we Orthodox Christians hold to be a true and full human being, body and soul. Does that child have faith? Can he? He has no reason; he has no parents who have yet told him anything and he has no known sensory experiences from which to draw rational conclusions concerning faith. Yet I believe that it is consistent with the mind of the Orthodox Church to assert that that child is indeed capable of faith. It is not based upon anything at all.


I'm sorry, but it really sounds to me like you're talking nonsense here. Faith is nothing without an object of faith. What is that object of faith, and through what means have you come to know that object of faith?
I believe you have misunderstood me. As I said above, faith certainly has an object, and that object is Jesus Christ. I have come to know him through the Scriptures and through the Eucharist. But my faith in him is based, that is, dependant, on nothing but itself. It is not irrational, but it is non-rational in that it does not depend on reason or sensory perception.

PLEASE forgive my extremely long post!

[M. Partyka]

Matthew,

Please copy your reply over to the new thread under "Tradition, Scripture, Intellect, and Experience" called:

Epistemology -- how do you know what you know?

I'd rather we keep this thread confined to discussion of the flood. Thanks!

[Alec Lowly]

Well, with an average of 3 children per couple surviving to adulthood, you could get from 3 couples of childbearing age all the way to a population of 3 billion in about 1500 years; make it 4 kids per couple, and you could get there in about 1000 years. Dispersing peoples all over the globe in that same time frame seems quite reasonable, even if you don't run the population anywhere near that high.

As for the genetic evidence for mankind's origins, I thought they had pushed that back to about a million years ago. Or was it 1.5 million? It's too easy to lose track of what's currently considered "indisputable". And the assumptions which go into those numbers aren't always obvious.

By the way, I'm not trying to defend the 4000BC flood idea. I do think the folks who push that view have some interesting points, but they seem to grab far more things out of thin air to support their theories than the "traditional" scientists do. I don't, though, think that the first part of your argument brings much to bear against the young-earth view. Whether the second part does depends on how valid the assumptions are that go into it, which I don't really have the background to comment on.

I tend to go along with C.S. Lewis in these areas - regardless of whether science seems to be supporting or opposing what you believe, it's best to just treat it with a "that's interesting", because science can easily change it's collective mind in a short period of time.

Mike

The other thing I find striking, Mike, is how quickly so many Orthodox drop their apophatic phronema when dealing with "origins" issues. "Oh no, we know ~exactly~ this, that or the other" ... "we know ~certainly~ that the flood was global," etc. The fact is, that the origins are a great mystery of faith, too ... One does not read either the scriptures or the fathers as if they were textbooks or operating manuals ...

[M. Partyka]

The other thing I find striking, Mike, is how quickly so many Orthodox drop their apophatic phronema when dealing with "origins" issues. "Oh no, we know ~exactly~ this, that or the other" ... "we know ~certainly~ that the flood was global," etc. The fact is, that the origins are a great mystery of faith, too ... One does not read either the scriptures or the fathers as if they were textbooks or operating manuals ...My understanding of apophatic thinking is that you define something in terms of what it is not. Correct? How, then, does one apply an apophatic approach to reading, for example, the story of Noah and the flood?

Usually, when I read a story, I tend to wonder, "What is this story trying to say to me?" I'm not sure into what kind of question an apophatic approach would translate. Perhaps, "What is this story telling me is not the case?"

[Herman Blaydoe]

To me, faith is another word for trust. I have faith/trust that the sun will rise again tomorrow, because it hasn't failed to do so since I have become aware of it. I have faith/trust that my wife loves me and will stand by me, because she has not failed me. I have faith/trust that the testimony of the Church is true, because despite my best efforts, I have not found it to be false. I have faith/trust in the ongoing relationship that I have with my God and my "faith community". It IS experiential. I won't go on about my own experience, that is between me and God, but I certainly TRUST in His existence, and it is not simply because somebody told me so.

Some have encountered God directly, some have been knocked off their horses, others have encountered Him through first hearing the Gospel and then learning for themselves through their own experiences, just as the Samaritans did.

Herman the Pooh

[Owen Jones]

Trust sounds like a comfortable, middle class version of faith: like Metropolis Bank and Trust. How can you apply the word trust to an all powerful, unseen mystery? Fear would seem to me to be a better term.

[Herman Blaydoe]

Trust sounds like a comfortable, middle class version of faith: like Metropolis Bank and Trust. How can you apply the word trust to an all powerful, unseen mystery? Fear would seem to me to be a better term.

Well, it works for me. Of course, fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but not the sum of it.

2 Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

[RichardWorthington]

If the entire human race aside from Noah's family perished, oh, 4000 BC, how then do we account for the dispersion of humanity, in various races, all over the globe, including the Western hemisphere and Australia, in so short a time? How do we account for the genetic evidence, which kicks us back 100,000 years ago to sub-Saharan Africa?

From Wikipedia



the identical ancestors point (IAP) is that point in a given population's past where each individual alive turned out to be either the ancestor of every individual alive now, or to have no living descendants at all

The identical ancestors point for Homo sapiens has been estimated to between 15,000 and 5,000 years ago, with an estimate of the human MRCA [most recent common ancestor] living about 2,000 to 5,000 years ago, that is, estimating the IAP to be about three times as distant as the MRCA.[3] Note that both the matrilineal and the patrilineal human mrcas are far more remote still, dating to some 150,000 and 90,000 years ago, respectively.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identical_ancestors_point (bold mine for emphasis)
see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_recent_common_ancestor


I was so amazed with this that I downloaded the pdf paper - very long so didn't read it.

In other words the IAP could be Adam and Eve, with the most recent common ancestor being Noah and his wives (we all come from Noah, but not necessarily from his first wife - although improbabe if Genesis is literally true in the sense that everything was the same as now). True, the science does not at all suggest any bottle-neck, but interesting never-the-less. With us being clothed in "garments of skin" at the fall, then it should come as no surprise that our fallen nature is derived from the animals, who were older than us (if this means tracing back 150,000 years ago then so be it!).

Now why has the magazine I subscribe to "New Scientist" never mentioned this? (It always bashes ID).

Richard

[Paul Cowan]

Just to be stubborn, I am going to stick to the 7000+ year old time line. We may not be able to gauge God's day, but we can human days and they seem to add up fairly well to a shorter time frame. Besides, seeing the technological progress of man in the past century, it is sad to think that we have only progressed this far in 100,000 years or more.

Paul

[Alec Lowly]

My understanding of apophatic thinking is that you define something in terms of what it is not. Correct? How, then, does one apply an apophatic approach to reading, for example, the story of Noah and the flood?

Usually, when I read a story, I tend to wonder, "What is this story trying to say to me?" I'm not sure into what kind of question an apophatic approach would translate. Perhaps, "What is this story telling me is not the case?"

You're right, strictly speaking, about the definition of "apophatic." But with this approach come other habits of mind that distinguish Orthodox theology, such as a holy reluctance to speculate further than scripture and tradition warrant (e.g, purgatory, transubstantiation). It seems to me that many religious critics of science's positions on questions of origin go well past the bounds of scripture and tradition ... It's the Orthodox tradition to treat spiritual mysteries with respect and circumspection ... I submit that the origin of life in general and mankind in particular should be viewed as a spiritual mystery ... and that the Book of Genesis is not a geology or biology textbook, obviously ...

[Owen Jones]

Apophatic is not the same as agnostic. Apophatic doesn't mean, "I don't know what to believe on that subject." Just to make what I think is an important distinction.

[M. Partyka]

Just to be stubborn, I am going to stick to the 7000+ year old time line. We may not be able to gauge God's day, but we can human days and they seem to add up fairly well to a shorter time frame. Besides, seeing the technological progress of man in the past century, it is sad to think that we have only progressed this far in 100,000 years or more.Are you limiting yourself to putting the creation of humanity within the 7000+ year constraint, or are you saying that the whole universe was created in the last 7000 or so years?

[M. Partyka]

I think it better to say that man as a whole is impaired after the Fall. Why? So that we do not think that there is an un natural dichotomy in man as if he is man in one sense and animal in another. The Fathers did describe some of man's faculties in a way that suggests impulses that are irrational. But this is always tied into the over all context of man as rational with free will and created in the image and likeness of God. The point here is that apart from using such language in a poetic sense- eg 'man acts like a beast'- theologically a crucial part of the Patristic understanding of man is that he is always man according to nature. Even his most bestial actions in other words, in reality depend on the use of very human faculties, albeit to warped purposes.Yet St. Gregory of Nyssa, describing the construction of man in comparison with animals and plants, wrote, "...the power of management according to sense...is to be found in the nature of the irrational animals: for they are not only the subjects of nourishment and growth, but also have the activity of sense and perception. But perfect bodily life is seen in the rational (I mean the human) nature, which both is nourished and endowed with sense, and also partakes of reason and is ordered by mind." St. Gregory views bodily life as expressed in stages. Plants grow and partake of nourishment. Animals grow and partake of nourishment, just like plants, but they are also endowed with sense and perception. Finally, humans grow and partake of nourishment, just like animals and plants do, and they also are endowed with sense and perception, just like animals are, but humans are endowed further still with reason and rationality. I don't think St. Gregory has any problem seeing human beings as "rational animals", for I would suggest it is because of our rationality that we are considered to be made in the image and likeness of God.

I suppose one could try to distinguish things further and say, "Animals have animal senses and animal perceptions, whereas humans have human senses and human perceptions," and try to suggest that humans are superior to animals in that way, but why bother? To me it makes more sense to say that humans are animals that God specially made to bear His image -- something to which no other species of animal can lay claim.

Tying this back to our discussion of the flood, in Genesis 6 & 7 God lumps humans together with animals under the term "flesh":

Genesis 6:3,7,12-13,17,19-20; 7:4,15-16,20-23 -- And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years....And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them....And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth....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....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. 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....For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth....And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life. And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him: and the LORD shut him in....Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered. And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man: All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died. And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.

The Hebrew word used for "flesh" in the above excerpt is the same throughout.

[Victor Mihailoff]

Granted, it wasn't really "Noah's flood" -- he didn't start it, just survived it -- but that's the shortest title I could think of.
It was global. The Old Testament tells us that the tallest mountains were passed over by the Arc. Noah sent a dove out to find out if it would not return, signifying that there was dry land for it to land on and seek food upon.

[Owen Jones]

Let's take a look at what is really going on in the Biblical account of a global flood. It is a classic apocalyptic symbolism. Because man has sinned against God, there has been a global apocalypse as a consequence of God's wrath, which is necessary for the purification of the race.

The symbol of a global apocalypse is a constant in human history, and it arises particularly in times of great existential unrest. And so today we have widespread belief in a global apocalypse under many secular guises. Nuclear annihilation, global warming, etc. Both Marxism and Naziism are secularized (immanentized) versions of classic religious apocalyptic in which it was necessary to bring about a great purging of humanity through violence and terror. Hitler wanted to burn all of Germany to the ground, in advance of the Allied invasion. By burning the Jews, he was simply being true to his apocalyptic madness.

With the latest, most popular version, global warming, we are consistently told that we have 10 years, no more, no less, to repent of our sins against the planet or risk extinction. But if we put our faith in Al Gore he will save us. He will save us by destroying our capacity to produce wealth, and have us all living as monks.

So the question of whether or not Noah's flood actually covered every inch of the earth or not is patently irrelevant and irrational, since it entirely misses the theological symbolism inherent in the story.

The Orthodox Church, in its wisdom, has largely put a brake on apocalyptic symbols. Our eschatology strikes me as largely non-apocalyptic. The Fathers do not emphasize this, the Philokalia does not emphasize this, or rather they interpret apocalyptic as a noetic unveiling, not an historical event.

It is a deformation of religious consciousness to view the apocalypse as an historical event. It was not, however, a deformation at the time of Noah, because it is a pre-Christian, pre-Trinitarian understanding of God/Man/History.

[Father David Moser]

I have moved the posts dealing with the similarities of man and animals and how that is seen in relation to the fall to a new thread called "Similarities between man and animals after the fall (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?t=4662)". Let us continue to focus on the flood issues in this thread and relegate the questions of the similarities between man and animals to the new one.

Fr David Moser

[RichardWorthington]

Does this help?

Noah’s Ark: Temple or Boat?

Although I will need to add something to reconcile the Genesis timescale and evolutionary timescale later - please be patient with me!!

Richard

[RichardWorthington]

Just a little note:

According to http://www.gnosis.org/library/dss/dss_book_of_giants.htm


destruction [is coming, a great flood, and it will destroy all living things] 13and whatever is in the deserts and the seas

If everything in the sea is destroyed, then some people at Qumran must have been interpreting the Flood story a little differently from normal!

Richard

[Effie Ganatsios]

The Flood

Local or Global

Most ancient cultures - those we have been lucky enough to have some record of - make reference to this flood.

Obviously some people survived and they were able to pass on this information mainly through myths and story telling, because that is how races who had no written language passed on their history to their descendents.

Effie

[RichardWorthington]

Most ancient cultures - those we have been lucky enough to have some record of - make reference to this flood.

"this flood": which flood?

As temperatures rose some 8000 years ago and the sea level rose dramatically, then it has been proposed that there would have been many local flooding events quite separate from each other. As such different cultures may well have a flood mythology, but without this thereby implying a global flood, such as Noah's is described to be.

(I read this in a science magazine I subscribe to, but cannot find the reference.)

Richard

[Vasiliki D.]

"this flood": which flood?

As temperatures rose some 8000 years ago and the sea level rose dramatically, then it has been proposed that there would have been many local flooding events quite separate from each other. As such different cultures may well have a flood mythology, but without this thereby implying a global flood, such as Noah's is described to be.

(I read this in a science magazine I subscribe to, but cannot find the reference.)

Richard

Hey guys, last year a team of explorers found what they believe is Noah's ark, in the mountains of Mount Ararat. They have evidence, they say, of sea shells at the peak - which can not be explained without a great flood that covered the entire mountain.

Just another angle to this great mystery - which my personal belief is TRUE! No matter how much scientific evidence they bring forward to support a local flood only ...

[Effie Ganatsios]

"this flood": which flood?

As temperatures rose some 8000 years ago and the sea level rose dramatically, then it has been proposed that there would have been many local flooding events quite separate from each other. As such different cultures may well have a flood mythology, but without this thereby implying a global flood, such as Noah's is described to be.

(I read this in a science magazine I subscribe to, but cannot find the reference.)

Richard

I should have said "a flood" - a devastating flood that was so destructive that it was remembered by those who survived and passed on in the myths and oral stories told by each generation.


I found this

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/flood-myths.html

[Ryan]

An archaeologist I knew liked to joke that someone discovers Noah's ark every 5 years- actually, it's not too far from the truth! I tend to disregard such findings. On the other hand, I think Christians should be more critical about the methodology and first principles of modern materialist science (which includes the science used by "creationists"), and not assume that the scientific consensus reflects the reality of the creation.

[Ryan Close]

2) Scientific evidence. Well, not being a scientist myself, I sort of opened myself up to some criticism. I do understand that there is some interesting circumstantial evidence, e.g. flash-frozen tropical animals in Siberia, or dramatic changes in sea level due to melting glaciers in the eleventh millennium BC.

It is also interesting that you mention Graham Hancock who proposes some similar dates for a catastrophe of global proportions recorded in every culture. He says there was some sort of "earth-crust-slip" perhaps triggered by a meteorite impact. The idea is that if the whole earth's crust moved in relationship to the underlying magma, then it would cause massive flooding worldwide from tidal waves and also move originally temperate climates into colder latitudes over night. As evidence, there are apparently collections of animal and human bones at the top of hills near the sea all over the world, as if animals and humans both ran for the hills after sensing tidal waves or raising waters. It would also explain the "flash-frozen tropical animals in Siberia." They could have been swept up in a tidal wave and then frozen when the earth's crust slipped moving Siberia closer to the North Pole. Scientists dismiss the earth-crust-slip theory, but what if there were some other way to explain it?

Either way, I think we need a third option. The Local Flood theory postulates a rather small flood in the area of Mesopotamian. The Global Flood theory usually says that a literal interpretation of the Scriptures necessitates that Mt Everest be covered with water. It is also meant to convey that unless the animal was on the ark, it does not have a contemporary descendant. There is a third option. A global catastrophe of some kind, imaginable by science, that could have caused massive flooding world wide, along with earth quakes, crumbling mountains, volcanism, ice disasters, darkened sky, and general chaos and formlessness. A flood great enough to cause Noah's ark to land on the "shores" of the "mountains of Armenia," in other words the foothills. Consider this quote from Josephus:


Now all the writers of barbarian histories make mention of this flood, and of this ark; among whom is Berosus the Chaldean. For when he is describing the circumstances of the flood, he goes on thus: "It is said there is still some part of this ship in Armenia, at the mountain of the Cordyaeans; and that some people carry off pieces of the bitumen, which they take away, and use chiefly as amulets for the averting of mischief." Hieronymus the Egyptian also, who wrote the Phoenician Antiquities, and Mnaseas, and a great many more, make mention of the same. Nay, Nicolaus of Damascus, in his ninety-sixth book, hath a particular relation about them; where he speaks thus: "There is a great mountain in Armenia, over Minyas, called Baris, upon which it is reported that many who fled at the time of the Deluge were saved; and that one who was carried in an ark came on shore upon the top of it; and that the remains of the timber were a great while preserved. This might be the man about whom Moses the legislator of the Jews wrote." (The Antiquities of the Jews, 1:3:6)He says, "many who fled at the time of the Deluge were saved; and that one who was carried in an ark came on shore upon the top of it." Consider that most people with wealth at this time may have lived in relatively low river valleys. Noah may have been the only man in the world to escape with most of his livestock. Consider another quote:


Now the sons of Noah were three, - Shem, Japheth, and Ham, born one hundred years before the Deluge. These first of all descended from the mountains into the plains, and fixed their habitation there; and persuaded others who were greatly afraid of the lower grounds on account of the flood, and so were very loath to come down from the higher places, to venture to follow their examples. Now the plain in which they first dwelt was called Shinar. (The Antiquities of the Jews, 1:4:1)Who were the "others"? Probably the same as the "many who fled at the time of the Deluge [who] were saved" in the vicinity of a "great mountain in Armenia, over Minyas, called Baris." These people would have been very afraid of the lowlands. They had just witnessed the waters make the earth formless below them and the mountains skip like rams above them. Shem, Japheth, and Ham were mighty men, princes, sons of a priest-king, like Melchizedek and Jethro, who built an ark and saved his whole household and latter planted a vineyard/temple (See Jesus parable about the vineyard with the tower in the middle). Noah's sons led the people there down into the plane of Shinar to begin the task of rebuilding civilization. From there, civilization spread out to the ends of the earth, to China in the east, to Egypt in the West.

Note that the Scriptures say the Nephilim survive the Deluge in Numbers 13:32-33:


The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.

[Ryan Close]

The problem with sites like www.globalflood.org and Answers in Genesis is that their science is not trustworthy nor submitted for peer review. None of their experiments can be reproduced by other researchers. The way they describe the flood, it churned up all the matter on the earth for a year and then deposited it in layers. The Global Flood is their key to explaining away geological evidence for the age of the earth such as the "geologic column. But it makes no sense.

For instance, they say oil and coal were created by all the plant and animal matter being swept into different vanes under the earth and buried when the mud settled to the bottom in layers that can be seen in the Grand Canon. They are saying that the sedimentary formations were created when mud settled out of the flood waters into layers. This is nonsense. First of all, imagine how deep the Grand Canon is. Almost a mile. Now consider that they have found oil in a well 8 miles deep in Russia.

Are we to accept that the flood waters teared up the whole face of the earth, over turning hills and mountains to a depth of 8 miles across the face of the planet, trapping plant and animal life 8 miles deep, and then settling into neat layers all over the earth? Take a huge fish bowl filled a third of the way full of dirt. Then fill it up with water. Then stir it up real good and let it sit. It doesn't settle into layers.

And even if the flood waters had done this, it would have obliterated traces of impact craters made prior to the flood. We have now found so many impact craters on the Earth that if they had all been made after the flood mankind would have been made extinct hundreds of times since then.

Now I know this is not a refutation of the global flood. It is a refutation of the so-called science of "flood geology." It might have been that there was a global flood that covered most or all the high mountains. But that flood covered mountains that were hundreds of millions of years old. Sedimentary formations are made over a huge period of time. Plate tectonics pushes mountains up. Wind and rain erode the mountains into soil in the valleys. The marine fossils at the top of mountains were once at the bottom of the sea and were pushed up to the top when two continental plates collided in slow motion. When Scriptures describe the "ancient hills" it means "ancient". All young-earth creation science can do is make up it's own facts and this causes all Christians to look like fools and liars.

[Ryan Close]

The Omphalos Hypothesis is the idea that God created the universe "as if" it had a long history and things as if they came about through a rich, complex, and inter-dependent processes. Omphalos is Greek for "navel." According to this hypothesis, Adam was created with hair, fingernails, and a navel, things normaly understood to be "artifacts" of biological processes through time. Hair comes about through a process called "hair growth," which takes place at a predictable rate. Suppose that hair grows one inch per month and Adam was created with four inches of hair on the first day. You could reasonably conclude that the hair started growing four month before God created him. In other words, Adam was created "in a moment" with an "apparent age," which, despite all evidence, is not true.

According to the Omphalos Hypothesis, the same can be said of the Earth. Trees have rings and soil appears to be made of decaying leaves. Adam and Eve may have concluded from this that created things are in a inter-dependent process of maturity. Small things grow up to be big. Soil is composed of layers laid down over time. Things look as if they matured through a chain of historical processes implying a history of at least a month even though God told them the whole universe was made in the last week. They conclude that they must trust God's word and not their own human reasoning.

This story, and the Omphalos Hypothesis, is a work around. It attempts to "work around" the problem of "apparent age." Apparently, the vast antiquity of the Earth is so clearly evident, and attempts at proving otherwise in the manner of the Young-Earth-Creation-Scientists so clearly fraudulent, that the only way of reconciling a young-earth presupposition with observable facts is to ignore the facts. Rather than making up your own manifestly un-true psudo-science facts the answer is to admit that we cannot trust our senses.

Once that is accomplished the hypothesis attempts to "work around" the ethical and logical problems of "apparent age." The idea that an infinite and all-powerful God would create out of nothing a universe that looks old is not logically contradictory because God is not limited to waiting for processes. God is not dishonest for providing two contradictory origin narratives, one in nature and another in Holy Scripture, because he told us which one is true. But in the end, the reason God choose to create the world with an "apparent age" is that he wants to test us. Will we believe what our senses tell us, what reason implies, and what logic demands, or will we believe what God has told us with a simplicity of faith?

This begs the question, has God actually told us that he created the universe in the recent past? The Omphalos Hypothesis assumes that which it attempts to prove, a universe created in 144 hours about 6000 years ago. The hypothesis solves an apparent contradiction, it gives an alternate explanation, but it does not offer proof of it's central claim. Why? Because young-earth cosmogony (cosmic origin) is assumed in advance. I know that many well meaning Christians hold young-earth cosmogony for essential exegetical reasons, but I believe it is a presupposition brought to the text. Furthermore, I believe the Omphalos Hypothesis contains a fatal flaw.

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

SIMULATION AND REALITY ARE INDISTINGUISHABLE

Stay with me here.

In theoretical physics, digital physics holds the basic premise that the entire history of our universe is computable (or simulate-able) in some sense. The hypothesis was pioneered in Konrad Zuse's book Rechnender Raum (translated by MIT into English as Calculating Space, 1970), which focuses on cellular automata. Juergen Schmidhuber suggested that the universe could be a Turing machine, because there is a very short program that outputs all possible programmes in an asymptotically optimal way.

If the universe is computable, capable of being simulated, then there is no difference between reality and a simulation of reality, if the simulation has enough detail. Therefore if God made the universe appear old, and if he did so by simulating a "fictional history" down to the most minute details, then there is no difference between so-called "fictional history" and "actual history."

For example,


It is impossible to conceive of a fully grown tree not composed of growth-rings, exactly because that is what a fully grown tree is, a collection over time of growth-rings. Growth-rings imply a complex and interdependent historical process. They are also the record of that historical process. If there were growth-rings in the fully grown trees in the Garden of Eden, then those trees must have grown up from seeds and saplings. In other words they must have had a history, a birth and growth toward maturity. If God simply created the trees fully grown in a moment "as if" they had a history, then that "fictional history" would be indistinguishable from "real history." Therefore, we have no reason to doubt what the apparent "history" of a tree's growth-rings tell us about the world including the age of the Earth.

Or this,


Light travels at a certain measurable speed. Simple observations of stars and rudimentary trigonometric calculations tell us how far away certain stars are from the Earth. Most of these stars are distant enough from the Earth that it would take many millions of years for the light, traveling at a certain finite speed, to reach the Earth. In other words the light from very distant stars strongly implies an equally old age for the universe. If the universe were created only very recently, say 6000 years ago, then how did the light from very distant stars have enough time to travel to the Earth for us to observe it? If God simply created the the light from stars in a moment "as if" it had been traveling to the Earth for millions of years, then the "fictional history" of that star-light would be indistinguishable from its "real history." Therefore, we have no reason to doubt what the apparent "history" of star-light from very distant star's tells us about the universe.

God may have made the whole universe last Thursday "in a moment" with a "fictional history" composed of tree rings recording season that never occurred and soil made from decomposed leaves from trees that never existed. There may be eroded mountains worn away by rain that never fell, glaciers composed of yearly layers of compacted snow, and very distant star-light taking millions of years to reach the Earth. There may be history books about wars that were never fought, written by authors who were never born, and childhood memories of scraped knees never scraped, all to give the effect that the universe created last Thursday had a history. But it didn't. This "simulated" history might be so complete no one could tell the difference. If so, we could not determine through observation or even through memory how old the universe was. In fact, since there is no way to disprove that the universe was not created last Thursday "as if" it were old, we have no choice but to assume that what careful observation of the world tells us about the universe is true and live accordingly.

[Ryan]

I can't say I follow the Omphalos hypothesis, but I must say, the "last Thursday" argument against it rather misses the point. The Omphalos hypothesis begins with what we know, from Revelation, about how and when the creation began, and then proceeds to reconcile this with modern science. It is not an attempt to "prove" creation, only to harmonize the two narratives. Therefore, we know that creation did not begin last Thursday, because divine revelation tells us it was thousands of years ago, and that the history recorded in the Old and New Testaments is real. For the same reason, simulation is not reality- the creations that take millions of years according to the laws of the universe were accomplished instantly by God. We may not know this from simple natural observation but we do know it from Revelation.

What I really take issue with here is the equation of modern materialist science with objective truth. It is very naive to accept modern science and its philosophical underpinnings, and then simply plug in Christian revelation in a way that fits.

[Ryan Close]

Thanks Ryan,

I found that I actually do believe the Omphalos Hypothesis. God created Adam with a full head of hair and a belly button. The garden in Eden had trees with growth rings growing in soil with decayed leaves in it together with tiny bits of mountains eroded away by millions of years of rain drops indicating a history that never existed. The garden may have been on a mountain with marine fossils in the rocks because God gave it the appearance that the mountain used to be at the bottom of the ocean millions of years before. He made it all in an instant as if it had a history. Yet the "fictional history" that God imagined to give minute detail to the universe in order to give it the "appearance of age" is in all ways indistinguishable from real history.

The difference between the Omphalos Hypothesis and Last Thursdayism is, exactly as you put it, that God told us when he created the universe. The point is to illustrate that if the universe were created only second ago with all the detailed evidence of history or the "appearance of age," we wouldn't be able to tell the difference. So if God created the universe a relatively short time ago with the "appearance of age" then we couldn't tell the difference unless he told us. Which he did.

Talking to my wife last night I discovered there are actually two ways to approach the Omphalos Hypothesis. My wife believes that God squeezed all the processes necessary for the creation of everything into 144 hours. He made the processes happen very very fast. I believe that the processes never occurred outside the mind of God who needed to imagine the leaves falling years before the earth was created in order to make them in an instant, three feet under the grass, already decayed, as if they had been there for years already. Adam looked up into the sky and saw light from stars that took millions of years to reach his eyes. He looked down and saw a fossil of a tiny sea creature that died millions of years earlier at the bottom of the sea before the sea bed was pushed up into the sky. And God knows the whole geneology of the even tinier sea creature that this first sea creature ate even though it never existed outside of his mind. He created the universe in an instant with the appearance of this historical process.

For instance, the Hawaiian islands are made because there is a volcanic hot-spot in the middle of a continental plate. The plate is moving north very slowly. The first island in the chain used to be as big as the last, but as it moved north it eroded away into the sea. As it moved north, the hot spot burst through the crust making a new island. There are almost 1000 islands in the chain. This must have been going on for millions of years. There is a lot of evidence for this but it is all the "appearance of age." The existence of the islands themselves are proof of this "appearance of age." God either made the earth with the "appearance of age" in an instant, or else he squeezed all the tectonic, volcanic, and erosion processes into a small period of time. Either way, who are we to argue?

I am not as skeptical of real science. I know its limits so I don't assign to it any kind of naive romantic notions. Scientific method is simply careful observation. You use science every time you build a house or bake some bread or go on a hike.

The distance of stars from the earth is quite easy to prove using simple observations and high school algebra and trigonometry. We know that light travels at a set finite speed. It has been measurable for well over a hundred years and been duplicated innumerable times. A supernovae is an exploding star. One night an astronomer sees one. Curious about how supernovas behave, he watches the area for a few more months. About six weeks latter he sees a flash a little to the right like a second supernova. Careful observation indicates that this is a reflection of the exploding star on a neighboring dust cloud. Because we know the speed of light and how long it took for the light to go from the nova to the dust cloud we know how far apart they are, namely six light-weeks. We also know the angle between the two objects as seen from earth. Using simple high school trig we can determine the distance from the nova to the Earth.

I am skeptical of young-earth-creation-scientists because they lie and make up facts to suit their theories. Many of them have degrees from diploma mills or operate science schools without accreditation. Some claim to be doctors of science but have never written a dissertation. Some are in jail for fraud. Their results cannot be reproduced and their findings are never published for peer review. They make Christians look like fools and liars. Why not just accept the apparent age of the earth instead of making up your own science. The Omphalos Hypothesis is handy when you are convinced the Earth looks very old but you know God tells us he made it a few thousand years ago. In other words, God created an old earth a realatively short period of time ago. If he made it with the "appearance of age" then we wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway. Who are we to argue with him?

Sincerely,

Ryan

[Vincent Ragay]

Well, Rick, no. There is ~not~ "some science behind this that is as credible as any." Creationism is simply not credible as science, period, because it dispenses with the necessity of falsifiability. Their arguments work this way: "If I had some cheese, I could make a cheese sandwich -- if I had some bread." Once I asked a creationist where all the flood water went to -- that would have been a simply stupendous amount of water -- and he told me that it had drained off into underground caverns. Then I asked him for evidence of the existence of underground caverns of that size -- and pretty soon he was talking about something else entirely. The plain fact is, the creationists have no new evidence, none, that would overturn the scientific consensus on the age of the earth, the origin of species, etc.

I may have found the most plausible answer -- a hypothesis, in fact -- to such a very important question. The science exists and has been with us for more than five decades. No, the water did not go down into "undergournd caverns" but remained where it was. It was the Earth that morphed in order to make possible the rebuilding our planet into what it is now. This fact really excites me! To tell the whole principle will take a whole book. Please check out my blog: www.manariwa.com for more.