Young Earth and Scientific Creationism in the U.S.A.

1
Young Earth and Scientific Creationism in the
U.S.A.

• Its History and Influence in Christianity and the
  Understanding of Science in the U.S.A.
  
• By
• Christopher Sharp
• University of Arizona

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Let us first listen to Ken
Hams Kangaroo Sound Bite
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Contents 1
0. Abstract 1. Introduction 1.1. What is Christi
anity, What is Science? 1.2. The Spectrum of Beli
efs 1.3. A Potted History of Cosmology 1.4. Hebr
ew/Babylonian Cosmology 1.5. Geocentric Universe
1.6. Heliocentric Universe 1.7. Our Location in
Milky Way 1.8. The Big Bang and Scientific Timesc
ale 1.9. Primordial Nucleosynthesis 1.10.The You
ng Earth Creationist Timescale
2. History of Creationism 2.1. History up to the
Late 1700s 2.2. Evolution of Creationism after 18
00
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Contents 2
2.3. Creationism since World War II
3. Modern Creationism 3.1. Creation Scientists
and Organizations 3.2. Answers in Genesis Stateme
nt of Faith 3.3. Why do Young Earth Creationists
Insist on a Recent Creation? 3.4. The Distant St
arlight Problem 3.5. Creationist Apologetics 3.6
. Noahs Flood 3.7. Plausible Scientific Explanat
ions for Noahs Flood 3.8. Creationist Duplicity
3.9. The Rotten Fruits of Creationism 3.10.Creat
ionism in Other Countries 4. Summary 4.1. Summar
y 4.2. A Last Look
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Abstract
Young earth and scientific creationism are two
distinct but closely related issues
(1) Young earth creationism, often abbreviated as
YEC, is a belief that the first 11 chapters of
the book of Genesis are scientifically correct,
in particular that a literal 6 day creation took
place about 6000 and 10,000 years ago, and Noahs
Flood was a global event that took place about
1500 years later. (2) Scientific creationism, or
creation science, is an attempt in apologetics to
support (1) using scientifically sounding
language. In fact this is pseudo-science.
The object of this presentation is to show that
young earth and scientific creationism not only
seriously undermine the teaching and
understanding of science, they seriously
undermine Christianity by making a number absurd
claims that are totally contradicted by well
established scientific evidence, in many cases
evidence that has been known for over 100 years.
The credibility of Christianity in general is
thus seriously damaged, and agnostics and
atheists can use the claims made by young earth
creationists as ammunition to ridicule
Christianity. The claim is thus made here that
young earth creationists unwittingly, or even
wittingly in some cases, undermine Christianity
by proxy. This presentation concentrates on the i
ssues of the age of the universe, the age of the
earth and the solar system, and the timing,
nature and extent of Noahs Flood. Other issues
such evolutionary biology, who was Adam and the
meaning of sin are outside the immediate scope of
this presentation.
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What is Christianity, What is Science?

• Christianity is about a relationship with God
  through Christ who atoned for our sins on the
  cross. Christianity is also an explanation for
  meaning and purpose of our existence.
• Christianity is not a scientific explanation of
  how the physical universe operates, nor how
  creation took place. However, in common with all
  other religions, before the advent of modern
  science it did give an explanation within the
  cultural context of the day.
• Science tries to understand the nature of the
  physical universe, and the mechanisms of
  creation, such as the Big Bang, through
  methodological naturalism, i.e. it is confined
  to only naturalistic explanations.
• Science does not address meaning or purpose, nor
  makes any assumptions about a supreme being, or
  supernatural processes. Teleology is not a part
  of science.

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The Spectrum of Beliefs
CREATION
Flat Earthers Charles K. Johnson - International
Flat Earth Society Geocentrists Gerardus Bouw -
Biblical Astronomer, Cleveland, OH
www.biblicalastronomer.org Tom Willis - Creation
Science Association for Mid-America, Cleveland,
MO -www.csama.org Young Earth Creationists outs
iders Kent Hovind - Creation Science Evangelism,
Pensacola, FL- www.drdino.com
Carl Baugh - Creation Evidence Museum, Glen Rose,
TX - www.creationevidence.org Young Earth Creatio
nists mainstream Henry and John Morris Inst
itute for Creation Research, Santee, CA
www.icr.org Ken Ham Answers in Genesis, Petersb
urg, KY www.answersingenesis.org
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Young Earth Creationists Omphalos
Philip Henry Gosse (1857) Old Earth Creationists
Gap Jimmy Swaggart Old Earth Creationists Da
y-Age Jehovah Witnesses - Watchtower Bible and Tr
act Society of New York, Brooklyn, NY
Old Earth Creationists Progressive
Norman Geisler Hugh Ross Reasons to Believe, Pa
sadena, CA www.reasons.org Old Earth Creationis
ts Intelligent Design Phillip Johnson, Michael
Behe, William Dembski, Paul Nelson, Jonathan
Wells, Stephen C. Meyer - Discovery Institute,
Seattle, WA - www.discovery.org/csc and Center
for Renewal of Science and Culture.
Evolutionary Creationists Schneider, Susan, 1984.
Evolutionary creationism Torah solves the
problem of missing links www.orot.com/ec.html
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Theistic Evolutionists Pierre Teilhard de Chardi
n Methodological Materialistic Evolutionists St
ephen J. Gould Philosophical Materialistic Evolut
ionists Richard Dawkins
EVOLUTION
Originally from http//www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wi
c.html with some changes
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YEC example Answers in Genesis

• http//www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/about/fa
  ith.asp
  
• D6. No apparent, perceived or claimed evidence
  in any field, including history and chronology,
  can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural
  record.

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Mainstream Protestant example Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)

• The ELCA doesn't have an official position on
  creation vs. evolution, but we subscribe to the
  historical-critical method of biblical
  interpretation, so we believe God created the
  universe and all that is therein, only not
  necessarily in six 24-hour days, and that he may
  actually have used evolution in the process of
  creation.
• "Historical criticism" is an understanding that
  the Bible must be understood in the cultural
  context of the times in which it was written.

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From the Archbishop of Canterbury3/21/06

• "I think creationism is, in a sense, a kind of
  category mistake, as if the Bible were a theory
  like other theories. "Whatever the biblical
  account of creation is, it's not a theory
  alongside theories. It's not as if the writer of
  Genesis or whatever sat down and said, 'Well, how
  am I going to explain all this?'. . . For most of
  the history of Christianity, there's been an
  awareness that a belief that everything depends
  on the creative act of God is quite compatible
  with a degree of uncertainty or latitude about
  how precisely that unfolds in creative time"

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A Potted History of Cosmology
Biblical Universe (Enuma Elish)
Geocentric Universe Copernican Universe Newtonia
n Universe Galactocentric Universe Big Bang
Steady State Inflation, Multiverse and Quantum Co
smology? Next Model? Yet the Next Model (and so
on)?
1000 BC
Before 1543 AD
After 1543
After 1687
After about 1850
1929
1950
Now
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Hebrew/Babylonian Cosmology
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Geocentric Universe
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Heliocentric Universe
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Our Location in Milky Way Above
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Our Location in Milky Way - Side
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The Big Bang and Scientific Timescale
1) 0 second to 10-43 second. Only God knows or
can know what happened during this period of
time. We know only that at least 9 dimensions of
space existed as what is called singularity. All
of the universe-to-be existed as a point of no
volume. Time as we know it was created.
2) 2. 10-43 second, also known as Planck time.
This is the point at which gravity, one of the
four unified forces, became separate from the
remaining three forces. 3) 10-36 second. The stro
ng nuclear force (the force that holds the nuclei
of atoms together) separated from the other three
unified forces. 4) 10-36 to 10-32 second. Immedia
tely following and triggered by the separation of
the strong nuclear force, the universe expanded
rapidly for this brief period of time.
5) 10-32 to 10-5 second. The universe is filled
with quarks antiquarks, and electrons. The quarks
and antiquarks combine and annihilate each other.
Quarks are in excess of antiquarks by a ratio of
1,000,000,001 to 1,000,000,000. The remaining
quarks will make up all the matter that exists in
the universe. 6) 10-12 second. The final two unif
ied forces split from one another.
Electromagnetism, which controls the attraction
of negatively and positively charged particles,
becomes separate from the weak nuclear force,
which controls radioactive decay.
7) 10-5 second. The universe cools to
1,000,000,000,000 K allowing quarks to combine to
form protons and neutrons, the building blocks of
atomic nuclei. 8) 1 second to 3 minutes. The univ
erse continues to cool, allowing protons and
neutrons to combine to form the nuclei of future
atoms.

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9) 10-32 second to 3000 years. Electromagnetic
energy, produced during the annihilation of
quarks and antiquarks, dominates the forces of
gravity. 10) 3000 years to present. Matter become
s the primary source of gravity. Matter begins to
clump with the aid of large amounts of exotic or
dark matter. This matter interacts weakly with
electromagnetic energy, but is able to clump with
itself through gravity, even during the
domination of electromagnetic energy.
11) 300,000 years. Continued expansion and
cooling allow matter and electromagnetic energy
to decouple. The nuclei of atoms are able to
capture electrons to form complete atoms of
hydrogen, helium and lithium. 12) 200,000,000 yea
rs. Galaxy formation begins as matter continues
to clump. 13) 9,000,000,000 years. The solar syst
em forms. 14) 10,000,000,000 years. Life begins o
n earth. 15) 14,000,000,000 years. Jesus Christ c
onquers sin. The inflationary big bang theory
is, by far, the most accepted theory of the
origin of the universe. All evidence gathered to
date supports this theory. Other theories rely
upon sets of unlikely circumstances or phenomenon
which can never be tested or proven.
Taken from the Christian website http//www.goda
ndscience.org/apologetics/bigbang.html
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Primordial Nucleosynthesis
The isotope 7Be decays to 7Li by electron capture
with a half-life of 53 days. Some 3H (tritium)
is also formed, but beta decays to 3He with a
half-life of 12 years. Diagram from http//ircame
ra.as.arizona.edu/astr_250/Lectures/Lec_27sml.htm
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The Young Earth Creationist Timescale
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Creationist Geologic Time Scale an attack
strategy for the sciences. Should the scientific
community continue to fight rear-guard
skirmishes with creationists, or insist that
"young-earthers" defend their model in toto? -
Donald U. Wise. From http//www.csun.edu/vcgeo
005/wise.htm
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History up to the Late 1700s
Ca. 310 - 230 BC Aristarchus of Samos was the
first person known to have proposed the
heliocentric system, but this was mostly ignored
in favor of the geocentric system.
354 - 386 AD St.Augustine of Hippo - "Usually,
even a non-Christian knows something about the
earth, the heavens, and the other elements of
this world, about the motion and orbit of the
stars and even their size and relative positions,
about the predictable eclipses of the sun and
moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons,
about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and
so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being
certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a
disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to
hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning
of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these
topics and we should take all means to prevent
such an embarrassing situation, in which people
show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh
it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an
ignorant individual is derided, but that people
outside the
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household of faith think our sacred writers held
such opinions, and, to the great loss of those
for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our
Scripture are criticized and rejected as
unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken
in a field which they themselves know well and
hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about
our books, how are they going to believe those
books in matters concerning the resurrection of
the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the
kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages
are full of falsehoods and on facts which they
themselves have learnt from experience and the
light of reason? Reckless and incompetent
expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble
and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are
caught in one of their mischievous false opinions
and are taken to task by those who are not bound
by the authority of our sacred books. For then,
to defend their utterly foolish and obviously
untrue statements, they will try to call upon
Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from
memory many passages which they think support
their position, although _they understand neither
what they say nor the things about which they
make assertion_. 1 Timothy 1.7 - De Genesi ad
litteram libri duodecim.
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1543 - Copernicus publishes De Revolutionibus
Orbium Caelestium (On the Revolution of the
Heavenly Orbs). 1483 - 1546 Martin Luther, le
ader of the Protestant Reformation.
"People gave ear to an upstart astrologer Coper
nicus who strove to show that the earth
revolves, not the heavens or the firmament, the
sun and the moon....This fool wishes to reverse
the entire science of astronomy but sacred
scripture tells us Joshua 1013 that Joshua
commanded the sun to stand still, and not the
earth." "Table Talks" in 1539. However, this
citation is in doubt. "Scripture simply says th
at the moon, the sun, and the stars were placed
in the firmament of the heaven, below and above
which heaven are the waters... It is likely that
the stars are fastened to the firmament like
globes of fire, to shed light at night... We
Christians must be different from the
philosophers in the way we think about the causes
of things.
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And if some are beyond our comprehension like
those before us concerning the waters above the
heavens, we must believe them rather than
wickedly deny them or presumptuously interpret
them in conformity with our understanding."
Luther's Works. Vol. 1. Lectures on Genesis, ed.
Janoslaw Pelikan, Concordia Pub. House, St.
Louis, Missouri, 1958, pp. 30, 42, 43.
1600 - Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake for
his many heresies, including teaching
heliocentricism and that the stars are distant
suns. 1611 - The King James Bible was first pub
lished. 1632 - Galileo published the Dialogue C
oncerning the Two Chief Systems of the World -
Ptolemaic and Copernican, which ultimately led to
his trial. 1654 Archbishop James Ussher calcu
lated that the earth was created on Sunday
October 23, 4004 BC. For many years this was
given as a
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footnote in the King James Bible. He also
proposed that Adam and Eve were driven out of
Eden on Monday November 10, 4004 BC, and the Ark
touched down on Mt.Ararat on Wednesday May 5,
2348 BC. 1752 - Franklin's experiment during a
thunder storm proved that lightning was an
electrical phenomenon. The church held that
Satan (the Prince of the Power of the Air) was
responsible for lightning, so to install a
"heretical rod" was to admit that centuries of
theological teachings were false. Churches were
reluctant to use them. Seventeen years after
Franklin's experiment, lightning struck the
unprotected Church of San Nazaro, near Venice.
This ignited 200,000 pounds of powder which had
been stored there for safe keeping. The explosion
wiped out one sixth of the city of Brescia and
killed 3,000 people. Lightning rods soon appeared
on spires across Italy. 1726-1797 - James Hutto
n, who was a devout Christian, is considered the
founder of geology, and first proposed deep time
and uniformitarianism.
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Evolution of Creationism after 1800
1797-1875 - Charles Lyell, who took Huttons
theories further and was more successful.
1807-1873 - Louis Agassiz, who first proposed an
ice age. 1831 Adam Sedgwick, ordained minister
and geologist, recanted in his presidential
address before the Geological Society of London
that flood geology cannot be supported by any
evidence. 1857 - Phillip Henry Gosse published OM
PHALOS An Attempt to Untie the Geological Knot.
1809-1882 Charles Darwin, who published The
Origin of Species in 1859. 1827-1915 - Ellen G. W
hite, co-founder of the Seventh Day Adventist
Church, with a strong belief in a 6 day recent
creation and a global Noahs flood, was
foundational in the beliefs of the SDA Church, and
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its influence in creationism beyond the Church.
1870-1963 The Adventist, George McCready Price,
published The New Geology in 1923.
1925 The Scopes Monkey Trial - John Thomas
Scopes was prosecuted in Dayton, Tennessee for
teaching evolution in a public school, in
contradiction to the the Butler Act. His
opponent was William Jennings Bryan. Scopes lost
the case, but later the case was lost on a
technicality. Bryan died a few days after the
trial. Although Bryan was strongly opposed to
evolution, he had no problem with an ancient
earth and a non-global Noahs flood.
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Creationism Since World War II
1957 Sputnik I was launched. This scared the
educational establishment in the USA into
creating a better science curriculum, including
evolutionary biology. 1961 John Whitcomb Jr. an
d Henry Morris publish their book The Genesis
Flood. This caused a major revival in the USA of
the creationist movement. Much of the material
in that book is based on George McCready Prices
book The New Geology. 1963 Henry Morris, along
with several other people founded the Creation
Research Society. 1970 Henry Morris moved to Sa
n Diego, California, to help Tim LaHaye found the
Christian Heritage College. 1972 Henry Morris f
ounded the Institute for Creation Research
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1981 Judge Overton rules that creation science
is not science, and should not be taught under
the balanced treatment act in public schools in
Arkansas. 1999 Jonathan Wells, Moonie (Sun My
ung Moon Unification Church) and intelligent
design creationist, helps to get evolution, the
Big Bang and long timescales de-emphasized from
the public school science curriculum in Kansas in
August. 2001 Evolution, the Big Bang, and long
timescales are re-emphasized in Kansas in
February.
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Creation Scientists and Organizations
Young Earth Henry Morris (hydraulics engineer ) (
Institute for Creation Research)
John Morris (geologist) (ICR) Duane Gish (microbi
ologist) (ICR) Andrew Snelling (geologist) (ICR)
Steve Austin (geologist) (aka Stuart Nevins)
(ICR) Russel Humphreys (physicist) (ICR) Danny R
. Faulkner (astronomer) (ICR) Donald DeYoung (ast
ronomer) (ICR) Ken Ham (educationist) (Answers in
Genesis) Jonathan Sarfati (physical chemist) (Ai
G)
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John Woodmorappe (aka Jan Peczkis) (geologist)
(AiG) Walt Brown (mechanical engineer) (Center fo
r Scientific Creation) Kent Hovind (educationalis
t) (Creation Science Evangelism)
Carl Baugh (expert in science) (Creation
Evidence Museum) Progressive/Old Earth Hugh Ross
(astronomer) (Reasons to Believe)
Creationist Non- Scientists D.James Kennedy (Co
ral Ridge Ministries, PCA) Tim LaHaye (Tim LaHaye
Ministries)
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Answers in Genesis Statement of Faith
General 1) Scripture teaches a recent origin for
man and the whole creation. 2) The days in Genesi
s do not correspond to geologic ages, but are six
6 consecutive twenty-four 24 hour days of
Creation. 3) The Noachian Flood was a significant
geological event and much (but not all)
fossiliferous sediment originated at that time.
4) The gap theory has no basis in Scripture.
5) The view, commonly used to evade the
implications or the authority of Biblical
teaching, that knowledge and/or truth may be
divided into secular and religious, is
rejected. 6) By definition, no apparent, perceive
d or claimed evidence in any field, including
history and chronology, can be valid if it
contradicts the Scriptural record. Of primary
importance is the fact that evidence is always
subject to interpretation by fallible people who
do not possess all information.
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Why do Young Earth Creationists Insist on a
Recent Creation?
Here is John Morriss explanation in an excerpt
from the ICR tape Science, Scripture, and
Salvation 378-Myth3 The Earth is Millions of
Years Old.
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The Distant Starlight Problem

• As we can see light from stars and galaxies
  millions and billions of light years away, this
  creates serious problems for young earth (and
  universe) creationists who propose that the
  universe is less than 10,000 years old. Here are
  some of their explanations
• 1) Astronomers are completely wrong about the
  distances, and all apparently distant objects are
  within a bubble of 10,000 light years or less
  centered on the solar system.
• The distances are real, but light takes short
  cuts through space according to an article by
  Moon and Spencer published in 1953.
  
• The velocity of light was much higher in the
  past, by factors of millions or more, and slowed
  down to the present value according to Barry
  Setterfield.
• 4) The distances are real and the light has
  traveled at a constant

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velocity, but the solar system was close to the
center of a white hole, which caused such an
enormous distortion of space-time, that billions
of years in the external universe elapsed during
the creation week on the earth. This is Russel
Humphreys relativistic white hole cosmology
currently favored by creationists, which also
claims that the Milky Way is near the center of
the universe and has an edge, as supposedly
supported by quantized red shifts geocentricism
revived. God created the light in transit so that
Adam could see the stars after he was created.
God being omnipotent is quite capable of creating
light in mid-stream, and giving the universe a
mature creation. This is a usual backup cop-out
when other arguments fail. Epistemological nihili
sm The non-answer that because cosmologists
have gaps in their knowledge about the universe,
in particular the nature of dark matter and
energy, some other explanation may exist, so this
issue is skipped over, and is another cop-out.
5)
6)
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On February 23, 1987, the blue supergiant star,
Sk 202-69, in the Large Magellanic Cloud was seen
to have gone supernova, and was named Supernova
1987A (the first seen in 1987), and the brightest
since the invention of the telescope.
The distance to the supernova is about 169,000
light years, so the explosion really happened
about 169,000 years ago. This poses a serious
challenge to young earth creationists who insists
on a biblical timescale for the age of the
universe of about 6000 years. A distance of
169,000 light years is far too large to
accommodate a biblical timescale, but is still
far short of the Big Bang timescale, so they make
obfuscatory remarks about cosmology, the Big
Bang, dark matter etc., that are completely
irrelevant. Not only do they have to explain how
in a biblical timescale light got to the earth
in 6000 years, but also neutrinos, which was the
first time these particles were detected to come
from outside the solar system.
Moreover, after the explosion we could see the
decay of freshly created radioactive nuclei,
showing beyond any doubt that the laws of physics
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and nuclear decay rates were the same in the past
as they are now. It is ironic that in their apolo
getics, young earth creationists insist that they
have the truth, but when confronted with
irrefutable evidence that contradicts their
beliefs, they deny this truth, even though truth
stands independent of anybodys beliefs.
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This figure is in Russell Humphreys article The
Battle for the Cosmic Center, ICR Impact No. 350,
August 2002. The caption in the article says Fig
ure 2. (Idealized) spherical shells of galaxies
concentric around our own home galaxy, the Milky
Way. Probably the shells are expanding, not
orbiting.
The text in the article argues that because of
the evidence of the quantized red shifts, the
universe not only has a center, but we are within
about 100,000 light years of that center.
Because the universe is so large, it is argued
that the chance that we are so close to the
center of the universe by accident is so small,
God must have placed us there.
A link is given to a shorter less technical
article on AiGs website for August 7, 2002.
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Creationist Apologetics
Some Creationist Golden Oldies (to argue for a
recent creation)

• Not enough dust on the moon
• Shrinking sun
• Decaying earths magnetic field
• Mans population is too small
• Not enough sodium in the sea
• Jupiter is too hot
• Decay of short period comets
• Written history is too recent
• Not enough supernova remnants
• Too much dust in the solar system

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The worldwide Flood, described in detail in
Genesis 6-8, shows how God repopulated the earth
from only eight people. This monumental event is
mentioned in the literature of various peoples of
the ancient world, providing compelling evidence
of its universality. If the scientific community
recognized that fact, a spike would be driven
into the heart of the theory of evolution, along
with the theory of theistic evolution.
(God-guided evolution). But humanistic man would
rather believe the unscientific theory of
evolution than the truth of Scripture that God
created man and will hold man accountable for the
way he lives. Pages 7 and 8 from Are We Living in
The End Times? By Tim LaHaye and Jerry
B.Jenkins, Prophesy/Christian Living, Tyndale
House Publishing, Inc. ISBN 0-8423-3644-3
(1999)
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New scientific theories exist which explain the
size of the universe in agreement with the
biblical timescale. One example is the
young-earth relativistic cosmology formulated by
physicist Dr. Russell Humphreys based on
Einsteins general theory of relativity. We are
told that this alternative to the Big Bang has
been well-received by scientists trained in
relativity. See D. Russell Humphreys,
Starlight and Time (Colorado Springs, CO Master
Books, 1994) In addition, the majority of
scientific age estimation methods indicate a
young earth. See Paul S. Taylor, The
Illustrated ORIGINS Answer Book (Mesa Eden
Productions, 1992) and Dr. John D. Morris, The
Young Earth (Colorado Springs, CO Master Books,
1994) Page 40 of Creation and Time A Report on
the Progressive Creationist Book by Hugh Ross,
Mark Van Bebber and Paul S. Taylor, Eden
Communications, 2nd Edition, (1996). ISBN
1-87777-02-9.
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What about Distant Starlight? Fallacious Distant
Starlight Solution Light Created in Transit
After presenting an alternative cosmology that
provides a plausible solution to the distant
starlight problem, it is worth showing why
another idea is unsound. Some older creationist
works propose that God may have created the light
in transit, and Ross harps on at this as if it is
still mainstream creationist thinking (for
example CT96-97). But AiG long ago pointed out
the problems with this idea. It would entail that
we would be seeing light from heavenly bodies
that dont really exist and even light that
seems to indicate precise sequences of events
predictable by the laws of physics, but which
never actually happened. This, in effect,
suggests that God is a deceiver.
Page 189 of Refuting Compromise A Biblical and
Scientific Refutation of Progressive
Creationism (Billions of Years), As Popularized
by Astronomer Hugh Ross. Master Books, Inc.,
P.O. Box 726, Green Forest, AR 72639, (2004).
ISBN 0-89051-411-9 However
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Regarding light from distant stars
How, then, could the stars serve as signs and
seasons on the earth if these stars were created
on the fourth day of creation and man created on
the sixth day? Would man have to wait many
millions of years before he could see the stars?
When God created the stars, He also could easily
have created the stream of light between the
stars and the earth. Page 13 of a childs book T
he Amazing Story of Creation from Science and the
Bible, by Duane T. Gish, ICR Publications (1990)
ISBN 0-89051-120-9 Note that this book is still
on sale! Note that the young earth creationist
movement, in particular Answers in Genesis,
appears to have launched a jihad against Hugh
Ross and progressive and old earth creationism.
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Also, the Ph.D. physicist and geologist who
contributed to the RATE book Radioisotopes and
the Age of the Earth have adduced several lines
of evidence that decay has been faster in the
past. They propose a pulse of accelerated decay
rate during creation week, and possibly a smaller
pulse during the Flood year. Page 382 of Refuting
Compromise. What Would Cause Accelerated Decay
, and How Would It Affect Different Isotopes?
According to the nuclear physicist Dr.Eugene
Chaffin, there are theoretical means of producing
accelerated decay, for example, a small change in
fundamental constants or the shape of the nuclear
potential well can have a large effect on the
decay rate (but little effect on radiohalo
diameter). Alpha decay rates are extremely
sensitive to the nuclear potential energy well.
If God weakened the strong nuclear force (greatly
speeding up alpha decay), the nucleus would
increase in size and restructure itself. The
lower the decay constant (that is, the higher the
half-life), the more the decay rate would be
accelerated. Again page 382 of Refuting Compromis
e.
51
If we recognize the empirical nature of true
science, that scientific models derive from
observations of data in the present, then we
recognize that the big-bang idea of the
unobserved past is not even good science. What
we observe are points of light each with certain
unique luminosities, certain spectral bands, and
other features like nebulous gas clouds. With
the exception of an occasional explosive
destruction of a star, these points of light are
not seen to change or move with respect to one
another. Their present state is not questioned.
Their past may be theorized, but there will be
more than one legitimate view of their unobserved
history. Page 136 From Is the Big Bang Biblical?,
by John Morris, ICR publications (2003). ISBN
0-98051-391-0 However Soon after Tycho's super
nova in 1572, some more variable stars were
discovered, including the first periodic one,
Mira, the periodicity of which was only
discovered considerably later in 1638.
http//www.seds.org/spider/spider/Vars/vars.html
The discovery of proper motions was made by
Edmund Halley in 1718. He noticed that the
positions of three bright stars (Sirius,
Arcturus, and Aldebaran) were over half a degree
different from those recorded by Hipparchus more
than 1800 years earlier. http//www.dur.ac.uk/john
.lucey/one_lab/pm_intr.html
52
Excerpt from ICR tape Science, Scripture and
Salvation 842-Myth7 That the Big Bang Has been
Proven.
The speaker is introduced as Dr. Otto Berg, who
is a retired particle physicist with NASA. NASA
does not employ particle physicists as far as I
know, and it turns out that he was not a particle
physicist, but worked with dust particles in the
solar system. He designed and built the dust acce
lerator at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center
(GSFC). He is also an alumnus of Concordia
College, which is a four year liberal arts
Lutheran college. He states here that there is no
way 12C (99 of all carbon is this isotope) can
be produced naturally, but explains that 8Be is
an intermediate nucleus in its production, if it
could be produced. In fact this is exactly what
happens in red giant stars. By mentioning a
production process that supposedly does not
happen, he is condemned by is own words, showing
that he cannot claim ignorance. See the
following two slides.
53
Helium burning the triple alpha process for the
production of carbon
This reaction actually occurs in two stages
first, two alpha particles resonate in the
low-lying (but unbound) state that forms the
ground state of 8Be. This state is sufficiently
long-lived (t1/20.968x10-16 s) that there is a
non-negligible probability that a third alpha
particle will be captured before it
disintegrates, forming 12C (Ex7.6542 MeV,
J0).
54
Because of its quantum numbers, there is only a
small probability that this excited state will
de-excite (rather than decay back into three
alpha particles), either by e - e- pair
production, or by a ?-ray cascade through the
first excited state, leaving 12C in its 0 ground
state. The prediction, and subsequent
experimental verification, of the properties of
12C in order to account for the observed
abundance of 12C remains one of the most
impressive accomplishments of nuclear
astrophysics.
55
Video clip of the first session by Hank Giesecke
held at Calvary Chapel in Tucson during a two day
creation conference on May 10-11, 2003. It can
be found at the website http//www.calvarytucson.o
rg/archive_creation.htm. Click to show clip fro
m 1817 1844 minutes on the hydrogen atom
To all physics students, throw away your textboo
ks and forget atomic physics, we dont know what
holds an electron to a proton. Just read
Colossians 117 and you will have the answer! He
is before all things, and in Him all things hold
together. NIV
56
White dwarf with rings? According to the nebular
hypothesis (Creation 19(3)26-29, 1997) of the
origin of stars and planetary systems, only young
stars should exhibit rings. Old stars like white
dwarfs should have long ago either absorbed or
driven off the dust, leaving only planets in
orbit.However, astronomers have observed excess
infrared radiation coming from the white dwarf
star G29-38, located in Pisces, about 50
light-years from Earth. They believe this comes
from a flat ring of dust, reminiscent of Saturn's
rings, about 70-700 million km above the surface
of the star.  The total amount of matter that may
have been accreted, so far, onto the white dwarf
is believed to be comparable to the mass of all
asteroids in the solar system.The Astrophysical
Journal, 20 February 2003, pp. L91-L94.Either
stellar evolution is wrong, or the star was
created recently (about6,000 years ago) and as
part of a mature creation. From the Answers in G
enesis website on February 29, 2004.
57
However, if we look up the paper in question we
can find the following paragraph on page L91
In order to model the circumstellar dust
emission, we need to characterize G29-38, a ZZ
Cet variable (see Kleinman et al. 1998). We
adopt a distance of 14.1 pc (Tokunga, Becklin,
Zuckerman 1990), a stellar radius R of 8.2x108
cm, an effective temperature T of 11,820 K, and
a mass M of 0.69Msolar (Bergeron et al. 1995).
These parameters yield a mean density of ? of
6.0x106g cm-3 and a stellar luminosity of
2.4x10-3Lsolar and imply a cooling age of 4x108
yr (Winget et al. 1987). And on page L92 we fi
nd the following sentence Since there are me
tals in the atmospheres of over 10 of all white
dwarfs (Zuckerman Reid 1998), it is plausible
that G29-38 has been actively accreting for 10
of its cooling age or 4x107yr.
58
Noahs Flood
What is interesting is that many creationists
seem to hold on to a literal global Noahs flood
with an even greater dogmatism than the age of
the earth and the creation week, even though the
Bible never says that the flood was global.
The two main theories that creationists have as
the main source of the water, are that most of
the water came from the fountains of the deep,
with a relatively small contribution from the
atmosphere, or that most came from a huge vapor
canopy that collapsed at the time of the flood.
59
Where then does this latter day dogmatism in a
global flood come from, as exemplified by this
quote? "...the main reason for insisting on the u
niversal Flood as a fact of history and as the
primary vehicle for geological interpretation is
that God's Word plainly teaches it! No geologic
difficulties, real or imagined, can be allowed to
take precedence over the clear statements and
necessary inferences of Scripture." Henry Morris,
Biblical Cosmology and Modern Science (1970),
taken from http//www.creationism.ws/biblical_floo
d_reason.htm This is bearing in mind that many of
the geologists about 200 years ago were
committed Christians who started with the
assumption that Noahs flood was a recent and
real global event, but with the accumulation of
evidence, they were forced to admit they were
wrong, as was the case with Adam Sedgwick, an
ordained minister and geologist, in 1831.
Moreover, many leaders in fundamentalist and
evangelical Christianity in the early 1900s had
no problems with a non-global flood and a
non-recent creation, although some had problems
with evolution.
60
The answer to this question is with the
scriptural geologists of the 19th century and
Ellen G. White, co-founder of the Seventh Day
Adventist Church. This was furthered by the self
taught geologist and Adventist George McCready
Price, whose writings, in particular The New
Geology in 1923, strongly influenced Henry
Morris, who with John Whitcomb Jr., published the
book The Genesis Flood in 1961. This started the
post World War II creationist revival in the
USA. From main stream creationist writings an a
pproximate chronology of Noahs flood and
associated events can be established as follows
1. The pre-flood world is a tropical paradise,
all the land is concentrated into one giant
continent, Pangaea, there are no high mountains,
and there is a vapor canopy, whose thickness
depends on the flood model, but it filters out
harmful cosmic or UV rays causing humans to live
several hundred years. Also the laws of physics
and radioactive decay rates may have been
different, depending on the model.
61

• 2. The start of the flood year, which according
  to Answers in Genesis was somewhere between 2300
  and 2400 BC (even they admit this is
  uncomfortably recent, but they know the truth,
  so accept it without question). Two of some,
  seven of others, of each biblical kind of land
  animal, including representative kinds of
  dinosaurs, board Noahs Ark from various parts of
  Pangaea.
• The flood starts with 40 days of rain from the
  collapsing vapor canopy and the fountains of the
  deep opening up. This includes comets and
  asteroids being ejected into outer space
  according to Walt Browns hydroplate model.
• The main part of the flood lasts about 250 days
  with runaway subduction causing rapid continental
  drift, e.g. the Atlantic opens up at the rate of
  several km/hour, and most of the worlds
  sedimentary rocks, thousands of meters deep in
  many cases, are formed, together with nearly all
  of the fossils.
• The final retreat of about 100 days, when the
  Grand Canyon was cut

62

• by the receding flood waters. During this
  and possibly earlier stages mountains such as
  Everest were pushed up, and the ocean basins were
  deepened, so the runoff water had somewhere to
  go.
• 6. In the post-flood world the animals leave
  Noahs Ark and make their way to various corners
  of the world, somehow the kangaroos dont get
  eaten by the lions on their way to Australia, and
  find plenty of food to eat that has survived
  being under water. However, all the dinosaurs
  saved on the Ark die out. Various other plant
  seeds, such as the saguaro cactus, also survive
  about a year under water. Incidentally, the
  animals hyper-evolve to account for the large
  number of species today.
• An ice age then follows the flood and lasts
  several hundred years, creating the Antarctic and
  Greenland icecaps.
  
• The ice age ends and sea level rises causing the
  Black Sea to flood. We are now around 1400 BC.
  Sometime during steps 6, 7, or 8 the dispersion
  after Babel takes place and the Neanderthals die
  out.

63
One of the main problems with a global Noahs
flood that creationists face, is that invoking
miracles as an explanation or saying that an
omnipotent God has no limits, requires that an
exceptionally large number of miracles have to be
performed, such as getting the animals to the Ark
before the flood, feeding and looking after them
during the flood year, and then getting them off
to remote areas like Australia and South America
after the flood. Moreover, God then has to perfor
m a large number of cover-up miracles to erase
the evidence, and make it look as if a global
flood never took place, such as the annual layers
in ice cores from Antarctica, except for the
creation scientists investigating the Grand
Canyon.
64
Plausible Scientific Explanations for Noahs Flood
Is it really necessary to accept a global Noahs
flood in order to appreciate the message behind
it, just as the Prodigal Son story conveys an
underlying message without being literal? Is
someone committing some sort of blasphemy by
questioning a global Noahs flood and daring to
find scientific explanations, and does this take
anything away from the Bible? There are several p
lausible explanations for the flood, which in
some combination may explain it, as well as flood
stories in other parts of the world, including
the Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic.

• At the end of the last ice age about 10,000 years
  ago, as the icecaps in North America and Eurasia
  melted, sea level rose by over 100 meters. This
  would have inundated coastal areas and low lying

65

• plains. In addition the breaking of ice
  dams would have caused local but catastrophic
  flooding. Many of the flood stories from around
  the world could be a distant memory of this, in
  addition to the fact that most settlements would
  have been near rivers and lakes, which are prone
  to flooding anyway.
• Specifically for the Middle East, there is now
  plenty of evidence that the Black Sea was a low
  lying freshwater lake until about 5500 BC, when
  the rising Mediterranean broke through the
  Bosporus and caused it to rise rapidly, see
  publications by Ryan and Pitman. This is a
  strong candidate for the Gilgamesh and Genesis
  flood stories.
• There is evidence of past flooding of the Tigris
  and Euphrates since the Black Sea flooding, which
  could have contributed to the stories, or have
  been a source for the stories.
• Some flood stories could have been obtained from
  missionaries in more recent times.

66
The Black Sea with the former freshwater lake
elevation (about -110 meters) shown as a dotted
line inside of the present sea level. Rivers
flowed into the former freshwater lake from the
north.
67
Creationist Duplicity
Andrew Snelling He has an identical twin with ex
actly the same name, address, and geology degree,
but they do not seem to know of each other.
Snelling 1 publishes creationist material, such
as SNELLING, ANDREW A 1986. Coal Beds and Noah's
Flood. Creation Ex Nihilo 8 (3), 20-21.SNELLING,
ANDREW A 1989. Is the Sun Shrinking? Creation Ex
Nihilo (pt. 1) 11 (1), 14-19. (pt. 2) 11 (2),
30-34. - The Debate Continues. (pt. 3) 11 (3),
40-43 - The Unresolved Question.SNELLING, ANDREW
A John Mackay 1984. Coal, Volcanism and Noah's
Flood. Ex Nihilo Tech. J. 1, 11-29.
Snelling 2 publishes regular scientific material,
such as The Archaean basement consists of domes
of granitoids and granitic gneisses (the Nanambu
Complex), the nearest outcrop being 5 km to the
north. Some of the lowermost overlying
Proterozoic metasediments were accreted to these
domes during amphibolite grade regional
metamorphism (5 to 8 kb and 550 to 630 C) at
1870 to 1800 Myr. Multiple isoclinal recumbent
folding accompanied metamorphism. Pages 807-812
(1990) in the authoritative two volume work on
Geology of the Mineral Deposits of Australia and
Papua New Guinea (ed. F E Hughes), published by
the Australasian Institute of Mining and
Metallurgy, Melbourne.
68
The references list eight earlier papers by
Snelling 2 in refereed journals (or symposium
volumes) on aspects of uranium mineralization
three as sole author and five as junior
co-author. Jan Peczkis (alias John Woodmorappe)
As Jan Peczkis, he is a high school geology teac
her in Chicago, Illinois, and has authored old
earth evolutionary articles. As his alter persona
, John Woodmorappe, he publishes creationist
material, such as Noahs Ark a Feasibility Study
on how Noah and his family tended about 16, 000
biblical kinds on the Ark. Steve Austin (alias
Stuart Nevins) Steve Austin got his degree in geo
logy as Steve Austin, but first started
publishing creationist material under his alias
Stuart Nevins, until he came out of the closet
and reverted to being Steve Austin.
69
The Rotten Fruits of Creationism
Creationism in general and young earth
creationism in particular, not only undermines
the teaching and understanding of science, which
are necessary in todays world, it undermines
Christianity by painting targets on Christians to
be shot down by atheists and agnostics, as well
as putting Christianity into the ghetto of
anti-knowledge and anti-intellectualism. When
some Christians have something important to say
on some moral issues, their effectiveness is
undermined by the negative image that
Christianity as a whole gets, as seen through the
eyes of atheists and agnostics.
It is my humble opinion that the professional
creationists, such Henry Morris and Ken Ham are
committing grievous sins. At best serious
ignorance is displayed in their teachings, with
facts being well known, in some cases by several
hundred years! Perhaps this is deliberate
ignorance in order to avoid the worse sin of
deception and bearing false witness. In some
cases the evidence is so strong that there is no
70
alternative but to assume that deception, either
deliberate or in the form of self-delusion, has
taken place. The professional creationists
appear to take advantage of the fact that their
audience often has little scientific training,
particularly in the subjects covered, so can be
fooled by scientifically sounding jargon. The
members of the audience hear what they want to
hear, and are happy to have their beliefs
re-enforced. In the mean time many scientists
who have the necessary training ignore
creationism. There are a number of cases of peopl
e leaving Christianity because of creationism, or
at least having a serious crisis of faith. Such
examples can be found on Glenn Mortons website
at http//home.entouch.net/dmd/dmd.htm.
71
Creationism in Other Countries
There is of course plenty of homegrown
creationism in other parts of the world according
to the traditions and religious beliefs of the
people, often being non-Judeo-Christian,
particularly in less developed places.
However, American-style creationism has appeared
in several places, including the UK, thanks to
Answers in Genesis. What is particularly
interesting is the Harun Yahya (http//www.hyahya.
org) Turkish Islamic young earth creationism,
which has its seeds in the influence of the
Institute for Creation Research when its members
make their many expeditions to search for Noahs
Ark.
72
Summary
Young earth creationism is pseudo-science and
cheap trailer trash theology that sells God
short. Not only does it undermine the teaching
of science, it undermines Christianity, which for
some people can have very bad effects.
I have demonstrated here that the professional
creationists take advantage of the fact that
their followers generally do not have the
necessary background in science, and use
obfuscation, ignorance, deliberate or otherwise,
and deception, deliberate of otherwise, and do
not follow the truth, which supposedly as
Christians they should do, indeed they deny the
truth when it contradicts their particular
theology. Lying for God is still lying.
I have given several examples in astronomy and
geology that show young earth creationism to be a
totally false teaching, that divides and
undermines the Church.
73
A Last Look
We will conclude with a video clip of the first
session by Hank Giesecke held at Calvary Chapel
in Tucson during a two day creation conference on
May 10-11, 2003. It can be found at the website
http//www.calvarytucson.org/archive_creation.htm.
Click to show clip from 1051 1518 minutes
on the Big Bang To all astronomy students, thro
w away your textbooks and forget about gravity!