A Desperate Attempt to Solve an Intractable Problem ("ancient" earth, young sun)

Proslogion ^ | Jul. 28, 2016 | Dr. Jay L. Wile

[fishtank]

A Desperate Attempt to Solve an Intractable Problem

Jul. 28, 2016

One of the many problems associated with an ancient earth is the young, faint sun. In a nutshell, we think we understand the way a star produces energy, and based on this understanding, a star starts off dim and grows brighter over time. Based on what we know, then, the sun should have been about 25% dimmer 3.8 billion years ago, when most evolutionists think life first emerged on earth. However, if the sun really were 25% dimmer back then, the earth would be far too frigid to support life.

[fishtank]

Artist's conception of a large asteroid hitting the earth

Image credit on webpage.

[knarf]

A VERY interesting line of thought I had never been induced to consider before.

[2banana]

It’s because we have daylight saving time.

[Red Badger]

All life on Earth is due to The Son......................

[MeganC]

I’ve never been able to understand why it’s so important to some people to know definitive dates on when God did things. All I know is that when I went to see the Grand Canyon and I sat there with my feet dangling 1800 feet above the next solid thing it amazed me that God started His work billions of years ago with that very moment in mind. He did it for me. He created that moment to reveal His Majesty and Glory to me.

That He did it in His time and not in ours is His business.

So if the universe is 1 trillion years old, a few billion, or whatever it makes no difference to my faith so why is it that it seems that some people can’t believe in God if He didn’t create the earth less than 10,000 years ago?

That’s not much of a faith.

[DJ Taylor]

In order to keep the earth hospitable for life over evolutionary history, there has to be this perfectly-coordinated “dance” between asteroid impacts, greenhouse gas concentrations, and the brightness of the sun, and any misstep in the dance would destroy life on earth simply explains to me why life is so rare in the universe.

[onedoug]

I didn’t see where the guy offered a different theory. Maybe I missed it.

[naturalman1975]

From desert cliff and mountaintop we trace the wide design,
Strike-slip fault and overthrust and syn and anticline.
We gaze upon creation where erosion makes it known,
And count the countless aeons in the banding of the stone.
Odd, long-vanished creatures and their tracks & shells are found;
Where truth has left its sketches on the slate below the ground.
The patient stone can speak, if we but listen when it talks.
Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the rocks.

There are those who name the stars, who watch the sky by night,
Seeking out the darkest place, to better see the light.
Long ago, when torture broke the remnant of his will,
Galileo recanted, but the Earth is moving still.
High above the mountaintops, where only distance bars,
The truth has left its footprints in the dust between the stars.
We may watch and study or may shudder and deny,
Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the sky.

By stem and root and branch we trace, by feather, fang and fur,
How the living things that are descend from things that were.
The moss, the kelp, the zebrafish, the very mice and flies,
These tiny, humble, wordless things - how shall they tell us lies?
We are kin to beasts; no other answer can we bring.
The truth has left its fingerprints on every living thing.
Remember, should you have to choose between them in the strife,
Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote life.

And we who listen to the stars, or walk the dusty grade,
Or break the very atoms down to see how they are made,
Or study cells, or living things, seek truth with open hand.
The profoundest act of worship is to try to understand.
Deep in flower and in flesh, in star and soil and seed,
The truth has left its living word for anyone to read.
So turn and look where best you think the story is unfurled.
Humans wrote the Bible; God wrote the world.
- Catherine Faber

I believe in God, and I've never seen a conflict between evolution and God. To me, evolution is the mechanism God chose to put his creation into effect. And what we are told in the Bible is the best effort by primitive peoples to describe what God revealed to them of his plans.

The profoundest act of worship is to try to understand.

[JimSEA]

A work in progress. This link summarizes a lot of current thinking on your subject. I would favor in my very amateurish way, the mass loss of the early sun. In short, it never was that dim and the sun has been losing mass to compensate. See the math summary at the source. There is geological evidence that both the Earth and Mars have had liquid water at early points in their history.