“For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day.” (Exodus 20:11a KJV)
According to evolutionary scientists, the earth is over 4 billion years old; but Biblical chronology dates the age of the earth at about 6,000 years. In an attempt to reconcile the two extreme positions, many creation scientists have used 2 Peter 3:8 to state that the six days mentioned in the Genesis account were not literal 24-hour days. However, if we used the “a day is as a thousand years” formula, we would have the six days of creation plus the day of rest equaling 7,000 years, at most. Hardly a good reconciliation with 4 billion years. So, how old is the earth?
From the beginning, the Jewish sages and the early church fathers interpreted the word “day” in the Genesis creation account as a literal 24-hour period, presenting a young earth. Scientists were in agreement with the young earth view until the early 19th century. Even the first edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, published in 1771, stated that the creation of the earth occurred 4007 years before the birth of Jesus.1
In 1785, James Hutton, the father of geology, introduced the old earth theory with the concept of uniformitarianism, which is the theory that geologic processes we see today are those that have always been. This was contrary to the prevalent concept of catastrophism, which states that only great disasters – such as Noah’s flood – can modify the earth’s surface. Although Hutton introduced his theory in the late 18th century, it wasn’t until Sir Charles Lyell popularized it in 1830 with the publication of Principles of Geology. The rest is evolutionary history.
But are we to believe that centuries of Biblical scholars and scientists have been wrong about the age of the earth? The body of Scripture supports the literal six-day creation. Mark 10:6 states that God made man and woman at the beginning of creation, not millions of years later. Also, the curse of death didn’t enter the earth until after Adam sinned, so there couldn’t have been millions of years of fossilized death prior to the creation of man. Neither did God place death into the creation He called good.
Recent scientific discoveries are even placing doubts on the old-earth theory. The 4 billion year age of earth is based on radioactive dating, which uses the decay rates of radioactive materials, assumed to be constant, to assess age. However, in 2009, scientists discovered that the decay rates are not constant, but are affected by seasons and solar activity.2 Additionally, in two similar experiments, scientists took lava samples from known volcanic eruptions from Mount Ngauruhoe in New Zealand3 and Mount St. Helens4 in Washington state and had them analyzed using radioactive dating. In both instances, the rocks were aged in the millions of years, not the actual age of 25-50 years.
So, how old is the earth? It seems Scripture is once again more reliable than some science.
1 “Encyclopedia Britannica: Supporting a Young Earth”
2 “The Sun Alters Radioactive Decay Rates”
3 “Radioactive Dating Failure”
4 “Is the Lava Dome at Mt. St. Helens Really a Million Years Old?”
Additional Reading: “The Earth: How Old Does it Look?”
January 1st, 2011 at 11:54 pm
Yikes – sounds like you are trying to justify your faith using bad “science”… faith needs no justification.
How come you quote only creation “science” and not accepted scientific research? Oh yeah, because everything you state is based on the fallacy of consequence…look it up.
January 5th, 2011 at 3:54 pm
Billy, I am not a science whiz by any means; however, isn’t research done by a scientist, scientific research? Or does it not count unless it was done by an evolutionist? I looked into the reference #4 that Rosemarie stated and this reference directly quotes a college textbook published by Macmillan…are they no longer a legit source of college text? I was under the assumption they print “accepted” research or is not valid because you disagree? I disagree with lots of stuff on both sides but I also have to admit when something is a valid point.
I do understand the evolutionist wanting to fight for radioactive dating because if it were proven false, evolution science saying we came from a big bang has lost its last leg to stand on if the earth is not billions of years old.
I do agree that faith needs no justification. In fact, faith is believing in something which can’t be seen or touched. Like faith in evolution. It is an unproven theory. Sure bits and pieces have been proven, but nothing definitive to validate the hypothesis that we all came from monkeys. You have to have strong faith to believe that. Just as intelligent design has only been proven in bits and pieces. I have faith in a loving God.
I love how I can be considered ignorant for believing the universe was created, when others are genius for believing we all came from a tiny mass in space which experienced a big bang. Then we all evolved from rocks and ooze. Hmmm.
That is, of course, unless you have a real argument and not hinging your argument on just saying a fancy “na-uh”?
February 5th, 2011 at 6:03 pm
Hey, I don’t understand it, so it must me magic. Let me take take some data from a study of radioactive dating, assume the scientific community has abandoned it and therefore the thinks the earth is thousands of years old, and then relay that to uneducated people. You really are pathetic. The only reason I’m wasting time writing this is because I’m bored.
February 11th, 2011 at 12:09 am
Please distinguish the ideas of “acceptance of fact” with “belief”.
I can BELIEVE all I want that the sky isn’t blue, but
believing it’s orange doesn’t make it so.
I agree with Bendrick Don Pedro…. I’m bored too. Go stroke yourselves into the oblivion you want to have
happen, just leave me out of your sanctamonious masterbation. Geez.
February 14th, 2011 at 4:13 am
Haha, I love how this “bores” you. At any rate, I am thankful you stumbled onto this site and even if you disagree with our science views, I hope you can find some great life lessons here which can apply to your life even if you are not of faith. With that being said, I enjoy a good debate…
What is pathetic is that neither of you can admit our current accepted evolutionary science is also basically a religion or belief system. To this day, macroevolution is a theory and has never been proven by any account. Microevolution has some merit but nothing on a grand enough scale to explain primordial ooze into a human being. Basically, someone created a theory, found a few provable tidbits, put it into textbooks and now we all have to accept it as fact. We are pathetic for questioning a theory that has made little ground over 150 some years.
In the same context, Christianity is a belief too. There are so many facets that remain unproven and must be believed. However, if you start to tear apart Biblical history and events, archeology and science have made more ground here than any evolutionist…just saying.
It comes down to faith. Where are you placing yours? In unverifiable science or unverifiable faith.
February 18th, 2011 at 10:48 am
Oh, we can debate all we want, Mr. Lawrence. However, science is a disciple (“the scientific method”, etc) which can be questioned/tested/revised based on facts and discovery. This is not true with faith. Faith exists in the absence of facts.
Creation “science” is wholly based on the fallacy of consequence – that if you don’t believe in idea “X”, there will be consequences. A perfect example was the whole Galileo vs. the Catholic Church debacle. If it weren’t for questioning faith with facts staring one in the face, we wouldn’t have gone to the Moon. Nor cured diseases (remember when the sick were supposedly possessed by demons?).
I simply don’t understand why those of religious faith find established science such a threat. Scientists are NOT on a mission to disprove God. This was invented by the faithful to find a demon to fight against. Now THAT is a belief.
As for macro- versus micro-evolution, this idea has LONG been scrapped, since the basis for both are the same. While genes can vary significantly between different life forms, the basic mechanisms of operation and change in all genes are the same.
So I ask you, Mr. Lawrence: what biological or logical barriers prevent microevolution from becoming macroevolution?
February 25th, 2011 at 11:50 pm
What, no response? Let’s debate! As Ms. Thompson said, “…it matters!” (Thank you, Rose Marie, for this forum!)
March 2nd, 2011 at 5:58 pm
Sorry to leave you hanging Billy. When was the idea of macro vs micro scrapped? When it couldn’t be proven? Micro evolution has been proven in terms of adaptation. Some organisms have been able to adapt to more/less light etc. All evolutions have been within species though. There has never been a proven case of one species evolving into another other than speculation. Most evolutionary theories are starting at the finished product and then working backwards. When the reality is evolution is the opposite…the reason is too hard to prove it happening that way. For instance, blood clotting. How many millions or billions of species became extinct because this trait hadn’t “developed” yet? We are way too complex of creatures to have just happened by chance.
Just because one small portion of a theory has been proved, doesn’t validate the whole hypothesis. That is like me saying that characters and events in the Bible have been proven to exist or have happened around the time of Christ. Does that prove all of Christianity to now be factual?
I can’t find any conclusive evidence anywhere of evolution on a grand scale. All sources I find have credible scientists (secular and creationist) debunking them as do the creation theorists. Bottomline is no one knows and it bugs the crap out of you. It is crazy to think we were created, so we create a big bang theory.
My question is if the big bang theory is true and we all started from a tiny ball of mass in the center of the universe…where did that tiny mass come from?
August 14th, 2011 at 4:50 am
I’m curious, if the sun and moon were created on the fourth “day” -as written in Genesis 1:16-19- how can we take the previous three days as literal 24 hour periods before the sun and moon existed? The LXX specifically says that the moon regulates the night, and the sun regulates the day.
It also seems kind of a stretch that Adam named all of the animals, according to their characteristics/habits, (it would take time to map the various animal behaviors, some of which have predatory names) and got lonely -hence Eve’s creation- before the 25th hour, being the seventh day. Lastly, it says that God rested on the seventh day, it seems like that day is still extended to our day, until he creates a new heavens and a new earth. Just my two pennies. Blessings…
August 14th, 2011 at 5:03 am
“So I ask you, Mr. Lawrence: what biological or logical barriers prevent microevolution from becoming macroevolution?”
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I believe the biggest barrier is with mutations. They are a loss in information rather than having creation power of “new letters showing up on the keyboard” (so to speak) So with this, some of the existing keys come off it instead.
August 14th, 2011 at 5:16 am
“My question is if the big bang theory is true and we all started from a tiny ball of mass in the center of the universe…where did that tiny mass come from?”
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Per the philosophical Cosmological Argument, the Big Bang Theory is actually a stronger case for Theism than Atheism. Atheists may charge us with the “God In The Gaps” idea, but theirs is a “Quantum Mechanics or Multiverse In The Gaps”, any of which takes the same road called faith. And Solid State Theory has its own set of problems as well. I have no problems with the BB.