Freethought & Rationalism Archive

excreationist · 01-01-2002, 07:21 PM

From AnswersInGenesis.org:
<a href="http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1316.asp" target="_blank">The Necessity for believing in six literal days</a>

I wonder what Christians think about this.....

Ken Ham's articles like this one were the reason that I went straight to atheism after I gave up on creationism.

theyeti · 01-01-2002, 07:48 PM

Speaking from personal experience, creationism is probably responsible for more atheism than just about anything else. That and the ultra-right wing politics of the Pat Robertson types are what finally drove me away from religion. I had always been a skeptic anyway, but creationism, especially considering the tactics used by your typical creationist, has convinced me that Christianity is intelectually and morally deficient. Obviously this is not true of all Christians (hopefully most), but the fact that many people could use it in this way -- including the fundies that have the hilarious total assurance that they're always right -- led me to see that it's often mostly a tool for controling people's minds.

Since I grew up as an Espiscopalian, the "six literal days" nonsense was never impressed upon me. I was shocked when I first found out that some people believe that. And I was even more shocked when I found out the lengths that they would go to, lies and all, to convince everyone else that it was true.

theyeti

Daggah · 01-01-2002, 08:28 PM

Our concept of a day centers around the way the earth revolves on its axis, and the sun's light . How, then, can the Bible use this concept before the sun had been created? According to Genesis 1:16, the sun and moon (complete with inaccurate description of the nature of the moon) were created on the fourth day. Gen 1:3-5 describes the division of light from darkness and calls the light "day." This seems to be completely against what we know now. Our concept of what a day is and what a night is is specific to the earth - other planets and moons take different amounts of time to revolve.

kwigibo · 01-01-2002, 11:28 PM

watch 'inherit the wind', daggah, i know you'll enjoy at least one part of it

LinuxPup · 01-02-2002, 12:42 AM

Being one who has weighed the biblical bases for both the Day-Age Theory (long periods of time, not 24 hour days), and the Calender-Day Theory (24 hour days of creation), I strongly believe the Bible contradicts the idea of 24 hour periods of time, and embraces long periods of time. Not only that, but the Bible also contradicts the idea of a global flood, but seems to agree with a local one. I have read Ken Ham's arguments, and have even spoken to him in person, and his arguments don't impress me.

As far as the light existing on the 1st day of creation, and the sun/moon/stars being created on the 4th day of creation, it is important to note the Hebrew. The word for "be" in "let there be light", is hayah, and is never used to note the creation of something. Light was not created on the 1st day, but became visible to the observer on the surface of the earth (the reference frame is given in verse 2 of Genesis 1). In verse 14 the same word, hayah, is used in "Let there be lights...", referring to the sun/moon/stars... and the work of that day is concluded with phrase "and it was so" in verse 15. The sun/moon/stars were not created on the fourth day, but were made visible to the observer on the surface of the earth. In verse 16 the Hebrew word, asa, is used, which is used to note the assembling/fabricating of something, to note the making of the sun/moon. But the verb is in past completed action meaning it happened on that day, or *earlier*. The atmosphere on earth in the early days of it's existance, billions of years ago, was opaque, not permitting light to enter... later on it became translucent, letting the *light* from the sun and moon visible, but not letting the observer to actually *see* the sun/moon.. kind of like an overcast day... on the fourth day, the atmosphere went from translucent to transparent, making the sun/moon visible to the observer. This makes sense of the apparent 1st/4th day conflict in the bible, but also happens to match the scientific data. Young earth creationism has gone from non-scientific, to anti-scientific, but embraces Genesis 1 and 2, without comparing it to the other creation accounts in Psalms/Job/Proverbs/Isaiah/etc. to get a more accurate understanding. If you're interested in getting a better grasp on creationism, try <a href="http://www.reasons.org," target="_blank">www.reasons.org,</a> <a href="http://www.swordandspirit.com," target="_blank">www.swordandspirit.com,</a> or <a href="http://www.godandscience.org." target="_blank">www.godandscience.org.</a>

excreationist · 01-02-2002, 02:04 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by LinuxPup:
...The sun/moon/stars were not created on the fourth day, but were made visible to the observer on the surface of the earth. In verse 16 the Hebrew word, asa, is used, which is used to note the assembling/fabricating of something, to note the making of the sun/moon. But the verb is in past completed action meaning it happened on that day, or *earlier*. The atmosphere on earth in the early days of it's existance, billions of years ago, was opaque, not permitting light to enter... later on it became translucent, letting the *light* from the sun and moon visible, but not letting the observer to actually *see* the sun/moon.. kind of like an overcast day... on the fourth day, the atmosphere went from translucent to transparent, making the sun/moon visible to the observer. This makes sense of the apparent 1st/4th day conflict in the bible, but also happens to match the scientific data....

So are you saying that the first day was about 10 billion years long, where the Earth was formed, and during that day, the sky turned from pitch black to light, then God created the sky, then the next day might have been about a billion years long and dry land appeared, then the next day, some fruit trees evolved, then the next day, the sky became clear enough to see the stars, moon and sun, then there were birds and fish, then on the sixth day, land animals.

Quote:

...I strongly believe the Bible contradicts the idea of 24 hour periods of time, and embraces long periods of time....

So do you mean from a plain reading of the Bible, it is saying that there was a big bang billions of years ago, then some stars were formed, and a planet called Earth came out of one of the stars, and it cooled down, then some life appeared, then lots of underwater life evolved, then plants appeared on dry land, and insects and walking fish went onto the land, then there were dinosaurs, then birds, then mammals?
I think that it looks like the Bible is saying that the Sun and stars were only made by God a couple days before he made Adam and Eve, out of dust, and following the genaeologies, this only happened about 6000 years ago.

Quote:

Not only that, but the Bible also contradicts the idea of a global flood, but seems to agree with a local one.

Where does it say that the flood was NOT global?

Theophage · 01-02-2002, 08:37 AM

Bold text is from LinuxPup:

...I strongly believe the Bible contradicts the idea of 24 hour periods of time, and embraces long periods of time. Not only that, but the Bible also contradicts the idea of a global flood, but seems to agree with a local one.

I have found that the bible contradicts itself in many areas, but this isn't the forum for that. The main comment I have for your statements here is that if God wanted to communicate the idea of only a local flood and billion year creation days, he could have, should have, and would have done a better job of it (to borrow phrasing from Don Morgan :^). The fact that it isn't relayed as clear as it could have been speaks against the idea of a perfect God as author.

The atmosphere on earth in the early days of it's existance, billions of years ago, was opaque, not permitting light to enter... later on it became translucent, letting the *light* from the sun and moon visible, but not letting the observer to actually *see* the sun/moon.. kind of like an overcast day... on the fourth day, the atmosphere went from translucent to transparent, making the sun/moon visible to the observer.

This is indeed the crux of your argument about the appearance of the lights, but the question I have is what is your scientific evidence for this event? What evidence is there that the early earth's atmosphere was opaque and then suddenly (or perhaps not so suddenly) becase transparent? References please.

In addition, you can still see the sun (roughly) on most overcast days, so I would assume that the opacity of which you speak would significantly more that a mere overcast day. Of course, even if you can't see the sun, you can still see the difference between night and day (light and dark) so it must have been damned opaque before the 1st day indeed. I find this very hard to believe.

Daniel "Theophage" Clark

[ January 02, 2002: Message edited by: Theophage ]

emotional · 01-02-2002, 08:45 AM

"The Necessity for believing in six literal days". Check.

"If we allow our children to accept the possibility that we can doubt the days of creation when the languages speaks so plainly, then we are teaching them a particular approach to all of Scripture". Righto.

"Let God be true, but every man a liar". Amen Selah.

All right, Mr Ham. SO WHAT IS YOUR EXCUSE FOR DISBELIEVING THAT THE SKY IS A SOLID ROOF ABOVE OUR HEAD PROTECTING US FROM THE WATERS ABOVE?! I DON'T CARE WHAT THE REALITY IS! THE BIBLE SAYS IT, I BELIEVE IT, THAT SETTLES IT!

Hypocrites all. They have it good that evolution is a historical science, so that they can deny it, but when it comes to the firmament, they have a contradiction which can't be glossed over, so they make it as if the Bible DOESN'T say the sky is solid. But it does! And if those cretinists disbelieve in the firmament, they might as well accept evolution...

Theophage · 01-02-2002, 08:47 AM

Oh, and now that I think about it, the fossil record itself falsifies the idea that the Genesis days represent actual periods of Earth's history. Genesis 1:21 says that whales were created the day before the rest of the land animals, whereas the fossil record clearly shows the fact that whales (and other sea mammals) evolved from land mammals, thus making the land mammals come first.

Sorry, please try again...

Daniel "Theophage" Clark

scigirl · 01-02-2002, 08:52 AM

Your links weren't working, but I'll post anyway before reading them thorougly.

There are huge problems with trying to interpret Genesis as being scientifically true. Even if you believe that the "days" were really millions of years, there is still a contradiction.

Kathleen Hunt at <a href="http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html" target="_blank">talkorigins</a> explains it this way:

Quote:

Literal creationism won't fly, but could the concept of "separately created kinds" still be viable, with the creations occurring over millions of years? This would require the following convoluted adjustments:

First, if every "kind", (species, genus, family, whatever) was separately created, there must have been innumerable successive and often simultaneous waves of creation, occurring across several hundred million years, including thousands of creations of now- extinct groups.

Second, these thousands of "kinds" were created in a strictly correlated chronological/morphological sequence, in a nested hierarchy. That is, virtually no "kind" was created until a similar "kind" already existed. For instance, for the reptile-to-mammal transition, God must have created at least 30 genera in nearly perfect morphological order, with the most reptilian first and the most mammalian last, and with only relatively slight morphological differences separating each successive genus. Similarly, God created legged whales before he created legless whales, and Archeopteryx before creating modern birds. He created small five-toed horse- like creatures before creating medium-sized three-toed horses, which in turn were created before larger one-toed horses. And so on. This very striking chronological/morphological sequence, easily explained by models 1, 2, and 3, is quite puzzling in this model.

Third, God did not create these kinds in a sequence that obviously progressed in any direction, as discussed briefly under model 3. This is not necessarily a fatal flaw (mysterious are the ways of God, right?), but it is another puzzle, another unexplained aspect of the fossil record.

Fourth, what about those species-to-species transitions? They appear to show that at least some species, genera, and families arose by evolution (not necessarily all, but at least some.) How can a creationist model be reconciled with this evidence?

Model 4 (literal young-earth creationism) appears unsalvagable, as all of its predictions are wrong. Model 5 (nonliteral creationism, with separately created kinds on an old earth) can just barely be modified to be consistent with the fossil record, but only with bizarre and convoluted tinkering, and only, apparently, if God created the world to make it look like evolution happened. In my humble opinion, this still utterly fails to explain the record's notable features or to make any useful or testable predictions. It also raises the disturbing question of why God would go to such lengths to set up the appearance of evolution, right down to inserting the correct ratios of radioisotopes in the rocks.

Genesis is a story, nothing more, nothing less. And has no place in any science classroom or discussion!

scigirl

[ January 02, 2002: Message edited by: scigirl ]

01-01-2002, 07:21 PM	#1
excreationist Veteran Member Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: Australia Posts: 4,886	The Necessity for believing in six literal days From AnswersInGenesis.org: <a href="http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1316.asp" target="_blank">The Necessity for believing in six literal days</a> I wonder what Christians think about this..... Ken Ham's articles like this one were the reason that I went straight to atheism after I gave up on creationism.

01-02-2002, 08:37 AM	#7
Theophage Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Tucson, AZ USA Posts: 966	Bold text is from LinuxPup: ...I strongly believe the Bible contradicts the idea of 24 hour periods of time, and embraces long periods of time. Not only that, but the Bible also contradicts the idea of a global flood, but seems to agree with a local one. I have found that the bible contradicts itself in many areas, but this isn't the forum for that. The main comment I have for your statements here is that if God wanted to communicate the idea of only a local flood and billion year creation days, he could have, should have, and would have done a better job of it (to borrow phrasing from Don Morgan :^). The fact that it isn't relayed as clear as it could have been speaks against the idea of a perfect God as author. The atmosphere on earth in the early days of it's existance, billions of years ago, was opaque, not permitting light to enter... later on it became translucent, letting the light from the sun and moon visible, but not letting the observer to actually see the sun/moon.. kind of like an overcast day... on the fourth day, the atmosphere went from translucent to transparent, making the sun/moon visible to the observer. This is indeed the crux of your argument about the appearance of the lights, but the question I have is what is your scientific evidence for this event? What evidence is there that the early earth's atmosphere was opaque and then suddenly (or perhaps not so suddenly) becase transparent? References please. In addition, you can still see the sun (roughly) on most overcast days, so I would assume that the opacity of which you speak would significantly more that a mere overcast day. Of course, even if you can't see the sun, you can still see the difference between night and day (light and dark) so it must have been damned opaque before the 1st day indeed. I find this very hard to believe. Daniel "Theophage" Clark [ January 02, 2002: Message edited by: Theophage ]</p>

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01-01-2002, 07:48 PM	#2
theyeti Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Denver, CO, USA Posts: 9,747	Speaking from personal experience, creationism is probably responsible for more atheism than just about anything else. That and the ultra-right wing politics of the Pat Robertson types are what finally drove me away from religion. I had always been a skeptic anyway, but creationism, especially considering the tactics used by your typical creationist, has convinced me that Christianity is intelectually and morally deficient. Obviously this is not true of all Christians (hopefully most), but the fact that many people could use it in this way -- including the fundies that have the hilarious total assurance that they're always right -- led me to see that it's often mostly a tool for controling people's minds. Since I grew up as an Espiscopalian, the "six literal days" nonsense was never impressed upon me. I was shocked when I first found out that some people believe that. And I was even more shocked when I found out the lengths that they would go to, lies and all, to convince everyone else that it was true. theyeti

01-01-2002, 08:28 PM	#3
Daggah Banned Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Deployed to Kosovo Posts: 4,314	Our concept of a day centers around the way the earth revolves on its axis, and the sun's light . How, then, can the Bible use this concept before the sun had been created? According to Genesis 1:16, the sun and moon (complete with inaccurate description of the nature of the moon) were created on the fourth day. Gen 1:3-5 describes the division of light from darkness and calls the light "day." This seems to be completely against what we know now. Our concept of what a day is and what a night is is specific to the earth - other planets and moons take different amounts of time to revolve.

01-01-2002, 11:28 PM	#4
kwigibo Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Gold Coast, QLD, Australia Posts: 5,814	watch 'inherit the wind', daggah, i know you'll enjoy at least one part of it

01-02-2002, 12:42 AM	#5
LinuxPup Regular Member Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 248	Being one who has weighed the biblical bases for both the Day-Age Theory (long periods of time, not 24 hour days), and the Calender-Day Theory (24 hour days of creation), I strongly believe the Bible contradicts the idea of 24 hour periods of time, and embraces long periods of time. Not only that, but the Bible also contradicts the idea of a global flood, but seems to agree with a local one. I have read Ken Ham's arguments, and have even spoken to him in person, and his arguments don't impress me. As far as the light existing on the 1st day of creation, and the sun/moon/stars being created on the 4th day of creation, it is important to note the Hebrew. The word for "be" in "let there be light", is hayah, and is never used to note the creation of something. Light was not created on the 1st day, but became visible to the observer on the surface of the earth (the reference frame is given in verse 2 of Genesis 1). In verse 14 the same word, hayah, is used in "Let there be lights...", referring to the sun/moon/stars... and the work of that day is concluded with phrase "and it was so" in verse 15. The sun/moon/stars were not created on the fourth day, but were made visible to the observer on the surface of the earth. In verse 16 the Hebrew word, asa, is used, which is used to note the assembling/fabricating of something, to note the making of the sun/moon. But the verb is in past completed action meaning it happened on that day, or earlier. The atmosphere on earth in the early days of it's existance, billions of years ago, was opaque, not permitting light to enter... later on it became translucent, letting the light from the sun and moon visible, but not letting the observer to actually see the sun/moon.. kind of like an overcast day... on the fourth day, the atmosphere went from translucent to transparent, making the sun/moon visible to the observer. This makes sense of the apparent 1st/4th day conflict in the bible, but also happens to match the scientific data. Young earth creationism has gone from non-scientific, to anti-scientific, but embraces Genesis 1 and 2, without comparing it to the other creation accounts in Psalms/Job/Proverbs/Isaiah/etc. to get a more accurate understanding. If you're interested in getting a better grasp on creationism, try <a href="http://www.reasons.org," target="_blank">www.reasons.org,</a> <a href="http://www.swordandspirit.com," target="_blank">www.swordandspirit.com,</a> or <a href="http://www.godandscience.org." target="_blank">www.godandscience.org.</a>

01-02-2002, 08:45 AM	#8
emotional Banned Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: Boxing ring of HaShem, Jesus and Allah Posts: 1,945	"The Necessity for believing in six literal days". Check. "If we allow our children to accept the possibility that we can doubt the days of creation when the languages speaks so plainly, then we are teaching them a particular approach to all of Scripture". Righto. "Let God be true, but every man a liar". Amen Selah. All right, Mr Ham. SO WHAT IS YOUR EXCUSE FOR DISBELIEVING THAT THE SKY IS A SOLID ROOF ABOVE OUR HEAD PROTECTING US FROM THE WATERS ABOVE?! I DON'T CARE WHAT THE REALITY IS! THE BIBLE SAYS IT, I BELIEVE IT, THAT SETTLES IT! Hypocrites all. They have it good that evolution is a historical science, so that they can deny it, but when it comes to the firmament, they have a contradiction which can't be glossed over, so they make it as if the Bible DOESN'T say the sky is solid. But it does! And if those cretinists disbelieve in the firmament, they might as well accept evolution...

01-02-2002, 08:47 AM	#9
Theophage Senior Member Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Tucson, AZ USA Posts: 966	Oh, and now that I think about it, the fossil record itself falsifies the idea that the Genesis days represent actual periods of Earth's history. Genesis 1:21 says that whales were created the day before the rest of the land animals, whereas the fossil record clearly shows the fact that whales (and other sea mammals) evolved from land mammals, thus making the land mammals come first. Sorry, please try again... Daniel "Theophage" Clark

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