> Now, in the early universe, until things cooled down to about 3000K, light
> (photons) was knocking electrons about, so that they could not stabilize
> into orbits around atomic nuclei. So, the electrons and the nuclei and
the
> photons were all mixed up. If we could view things as they were at that
> point, we would see nothing: a void. A very energetic void, but quite
> invisible because light would not be visible.
Okay, I'll give you this one. There was no visible light until energy
decoupled from matter, at which point, the energy expanded at the speed of
light and didn't hang around for us to detect as background radiation thus
the Big Bang model doesn't really predict background radiation so I don't
need to appeal to diffused energy from stars to explain it. You see why I'm
giving it to you, it hurts too much to think about it. <grin>
> Then, that critical threshold was reached and "God divided the light from
> the darkness"
So, "let there be light" is not a reference to the Big Bang itself, just the
point in time when matter and energy decoupled? Okay, one contradiction
resolved (except that God apparently created the Earth before energy and
matter decoupled, "In the beginning God created the... earth.")
> If you want to read an interesting book which postulates both a literal
> interpretation, and an old universe, read "Genesis and the Big Bang: The
> Discovery of Harmony Between Modern Science and the Bible." By Dr. Gerald
> Schroeder
What does Shroeder say caused the Big Bang? God? If the Big Bang is based
on assumptions of naturalism, why stop before you get to the cause? Because
you can't think of a natural cause? Can you say "God of the gaps."
> Actually, Dr. Schroeder uses commentary from Old Testament scholars from
> before Galileo to show that people with an intimate understanding of these
> passages in their native language described an early universe much like
> science is discovering today through high energy and particle physics.
I'll try to track down a copy of the book. Although, I'm aware that there
has always been people who believed the Bible but had different
interpretations of Genesis than is now popular among Creationists.
> > rather they take their non-Biblical beliefs and "make worthless" the
Bible
> > as much as necessary until their beliefs are no longer in conflict with
the
> > Bible. You're not finding meaning in the Bible, you're rejecting what
it
> > ostensibly says and imposing your non-Biblical beliefs on it.
>
> You do not know me. You do not know what the Bible means to me. You are
> ignoring the Bible yourself by making such assertions about my testimony
of
> the book. I see a way for the Bible to be historical, as well as wholly
> compatible with an old universe. The belief in an old universe does not
> equal a belief in naturalistic evolution.
I consider Evolution and the Big Bang to be non-Biblical. When you read the
Big Bang into the Bible, I see that as imposing a non-Biblical belief on the
Bible. BTW, non-biblical doesn't mean false, it just means you didn't get
it form the Bible. If I had meant to be even slightly derogatory, I would
have said "your anti-Biblical beliefs."
> The Big Bang is no mere explosion. That is just an analogy used
> to make it more comprehensible.
The Big Bang provides for the ultimate isolated system. In such a system,
complexity can only decrease with time. In what fashion has there been a
loss of complexity sense the Big Bang?
> Okay, gravity is actually a pretty weak force.
How about when it is backed up by all the mass in the universe in a
concentrated form? The fastest the universe could have expanded is at the
speed of light, gravity would have effortlessly put the breaks on before the
expansion got very far. If you propose that it isn't momentum causing the
universe to expand, then what is? Whatever it is must violate the First law
of Thermodynamics (expansion without momentum would require additional
energy input into the universe).
> We do look at diffused energy from stars all the time. That is how we see
> them, by visible spectrum or radio telescopes. Subtracting this radiation
> away, we get the background radiation of a steady 3.5 K above
> absolute zero.
Cosmic rays were once thought to be background energy, but we've learned
better now. I suspect that some guy will eventually demonstrate that a
source for the 3.5K, and that source won't be the Big Bang.
> I don't know as there is a lack of anti-matter. It wouldn't be floating
> around here, or we would be annihilated.
When energy is converted to matter, it creates an equal amount of
anti-matter as matter. But, we don't see any significant amount of
anti-matter in the universe.
> > God did not create the appearance of age, your false assumptions is the
> > source of what you would consider a false appearance of age.
>
> List the scientific evidence for a young earth.
There is no such thing as a non-radiometric process that indicates the Earth
is 4.5 billion years old. I could identify numerous processes than indicate
that the Earth is much younger than 4.5 billion years old and all you (or
any old-earther) could do is claim that they're not useful for dating the
Earth, for some reason such as pleading that the process is cyclic.
I use to consider the decay of Earth's magnetic fields as a good evidence of
a young Earth. There are no observed bands of magnetic reversals on the
ocean's floor (the alleged reversed bands are graphed with a meter that
measures magnetic field strength, a compass will always point north as it
traverses the bands). There is no *known* mechanism in the Earth to reverse
the field. Self-induction ideally describes the observed change in the
dipole (and implies there is nothing fueling the field). Appeals to
drifting poles does nothing to explain reversals (except to make me ask "if
the pole wonders so much, how come all the remnants on the ocean floor are
north-south, maybe the pole hasn't had much time to wonder?"). However, I
must be missing something because the Creationist community now seems to be
in agreement that the field has reversed a bunch of times, just in a real
short period, but that it otherwise is still decaying the same 1400 year
half-life as always. Until I find a good explanation for this new
Creationist view, I'm inclined to give the point to Evolutionists.
The moon's recession is good. At the rate it's recessing, it couldn't be
billions of years old. I've never seen an Evolutionist demonstrate that it
is recessing faster now than it once was.
Another good one is the rate at which the existence of large amounts of
sedimentary rock on the Earth's surface. Erosion would remove all the land
mass above sea-level in 14 million years. You can appeal to the land being
pushed up, but it's metamorphic rock that would be popping up.
I've got a lot more, but the more I give, the less attention each one will
get. I've already seen the responses to my previous arguments (e.g. the
lack of human history beyond 5000 years) and know that even with attention,
what I consider commonsense doesn't always prevail (I find it incredible
that no modern-human society invented writing for a 100,000 years -- not
everyone would have had anti-technology cultures such as what existed in
Africa until very recently).
> > If you assume
> > naturalistic precursors to what God did, then it's going to
> > look older to you than it really is.
>
> God created the universe, so how could there be naturalistic precursors to
> what God did?
Right, I said "If you assume..." If you assume that the universe started
with a Big Bang, it's going to have to be more than some thousands of years
old (it's going to have to be more than some trillions of years old to
account for the gravitational formation of some supergalatic structures).
If the universe is going to need to be billions or trillions of years old to
fit into your model, then it's going to look older than it is, if it isn't
that old. Got it? It's not that God lied, it's that your model is wrong.
> Am I describing naturalistic processes? Yes. Do I believe these
processes
> exist without God? No. God created the laws and constants by which the
> universe works.
The sun's hydrogen/helium ratio is essentially the same as that of a large
gas planet that has never fused a thing. Is that not a problem for your
natural scenario of heavy elements being produced before the Earth? You've
told a just-so story (not quoted), without regard for the problems you might
run into.
> The flood is real. I believe it happened. How would the age of the
> universe or the creation of life on earth conflict with this?
Was the Flood local? If so, why didn't Noah just migrate? When was the
Flood? It seems to be that because you've accepted the secular history of
the Earth, you're going to have a lot of trouble fitting stuff in without
creating more problems.
--------
RE:PE
> At first, I was quite unimpressed myself. I was thinking...Okay, so how
in
> the world is there all of the sudden going to be enough mutations to have
> new species appear suddenly? There aren't. Do new species appear when
the
> present species is successful? Probably not. Is there a lack of
mutations
> during the static period? No. They simply do not manifest, but are
carrie
> down through the generations. Then, there is some enviromental stress...a
> new competitor, or a change in climate. Suddenly, these mutations which
may
> occur individually from time to time become advantageous for some reason.
> Several different unusual phenotypes, because of their advantage, become
> normal. A threshold is reached and a new species is born. It is so fast,
> that there is little in the geologic record. So, the change is gradual,
but
> in genotypes, not phenotypes.
I offered PE as an example of Evolutionists patching the Theory of Evolution
to save it from a failed test. Anyway, I haven't read the Talk.Origins PE
FAQ, but I believe I'm failure enough with the doctrine to strongly disagree
with it. Does the FAQ address this:
Unless the population is exponentially growing, there is stress and
competition for survival. PE advocates toss out of the window all the
commonsense which Darwin attempted to bring to the subject. Mutations are
constant (usually not affected by the environment). And, if the population
size is constant, then so is the selection/stress/pressure (this is
essentially Darwin's argument for gradualism). Something sure is killing
most of the offspring before they can reproduce -- and those dead offspring
would certainly have benefited from a good mutation.
Environment would really only affect the direction NOT THE RATE of
evolution. When the environment changes, the group of "good" mutations
would change, but the rate would stay the same. If you're suggesting that a
number of mutations are somehow suppressed, not eliminated, in a population
until the right environment comes along -- how long can a population
accumulate these mutations before it's forced to "evolve," assuming the
environment never changes? And, if Evolution is true, how can there ever be
periods of stability (remember, there's always pressure and there's always
mutations)?
Sharks have stayed the same for millions of years (right?), same with any of
the major groups of marine invertebrates. Of course, the ocean provides a
very stable long-term environment. So, how did the marine invertebrates
turn into fish, and the fish start walking onto the land, all the time the
sharks just keep swimming around (not to say that sharks go back as far as
marine invertebrates, they're fish). As far as I can tell, they evolve if
they do, the don't if they don't.
> We can test PE by knowing the gene map of a species and observing its
drift,
> and under either isolation or stress, its speciation. If we do not
observe
> the gradual genetic change (through mutations) which is subsequently
focused
> into physical change then PE will be invalidated.
What does PE look like on a gene map? Isolated kinds?