----- Original Message -----
From: "Darryl Maddox" <dpmaddox@arn.net>
To: <asa@calvin.edu>; "Bill Payne" <bpayne15@juno.com>
Sent: Sunday, June 25, 2000 3:29 PM
Subject: Re: Flood
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Bill Payne" <bpayne15@juno.com>
> To: <asa@calvin.edu>
> Sent: Sunday, June 25, 2000 7:46 AM
> Subject: Re: Flood
>
>
> > On Sat, 24 Jun 2000 03:07:05 EDT PHSEELY@aol.com writes:
> >
> > >If Gen 6-9 is taken as a VCR account, you are right. It cannot be
> > harmonized
> > >with a local flood---or a global flood either. Both camps have to
> > >ignore/bend Scripture and scientific data to make their theory fit.
> >
> > What does the global flood camp have to ignorebend?
> >
> > Bill
> >
>
> After spending a few years researching the physical geology aspects of
this
> topic rather carefully I would say about 90% of the sedimentological data,
> most of the paleontological sequence data, most of the paleoenvironmental
> data, and > 90% of the radiometric age data (if you throw in a young
earth
> along with a universal flood) and a still significant amount of the
> radiometric data if you only insist on a universal flood but do not insist
> on a young earth. How you would do that or whether anyone does is not a
> question I have addressed or even care to address. But hey, everyone has
to
> fudge (i.e. ignore or bend from previous posts) a bit here or there. And
> as long as we are all friends and can accept the following: most of us do
a
> bit of fuding to neaten up the story; a bit of fudging almost always has
to
> happen to make a reasonbly complete and coherent story about complex
issues
> such as earth history; and that we are not all willing to fudge in the
same
> place, it's ok that no one has a story that is a perfect fit with the
data.
> No one ever said science would be easy or neat and complet. But it is a
lot
> of fun.
>
I should not have said the "data" was what had to be ignored or bent. The
data can neither be ignored nor bent. Rather, I should have said it is our
interpretations of the data and the coherence between those interpretations
and laboratory and field experiments + chemical and physical theories and
data which have also been independently verified through laboratory work
that get ignored or bent. As an example: There is substantial data on
settling rates of particulate materials of various sizes. The no universal
flood group infers from this data and the existance of deposits of small
size (+ other data) that the material was deposited slowly. However, the
universal flood group ignores this interpretation (they can not ignore the
existance of the rocks) and offers alternative interpretations.
As the guys from ICR, and perhaps elswhere, point out (and I think rightly
so) we are all using the same data. The difference is how we interpret it
and how well those interpretations fit together and fit with the other areas
of science that separate the groups.
As I tried to say in the last few sentences of my previous post - I believe
this is the way it always is in any area where there is not complete
unanimity, whether we are solving a crime, desiding on a political policy,
or infering past events and processes. Until there is unanimity on the
criteria by which the various theories are to be evaluated, we can't have
unanimity on the conclusions.
Sorry about the sloppy wording.
Darryl
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Jun 25 2000 - 16:51:28 EDT