What scientists forget is that uniformitarianism and catastrophism are axioms, not fact.
Scientists assume that the physical laws of the universe are universal, and apply in exactly the same manner across all of space and time.
This is something that simply cannot be proved, it’s assumed to be true a priori.
There is clear evidence, here on earth, that contradicts the young earth theory. There are lakes with layered sedimentation, where we can observe layers being created annually, that have more than 30,000 layers present. There are glaciers where we can see ice layers being created annually, where we can see more that 100,000 layers.
There are only two possible explanations for these - either the physical processes that operate on these lakes and glaciers have been the same, for the last 100,000 years, and they really are that old, or there was a change in the physical processes, and when they were created, they were created with the appearance of history.
There can be no scientific means of distinguishing between these two.
There are lakes with layered sedimentation, where we can observe layers being created annually, that have more than 30,000 layers present.
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Polystrate fossils.
Then, there’s the London Hammer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Hammer
There can be no scientific means of distinguishing between these two."
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If I were a young earth creationist (I'm actually an Intelligent Design guy), I would claim that the Earth and the Universe were indeed created with the appearance of history. If God created the Universe (which he most certainly did), He could also create it with all the appearance of it being more than 6000 years old. I have put that forth in some Bible studies when we discussed creation just to see what people would say. The argument I usually get is that God would not create a deception like that. However, God *does* allow evil (Job 2), so that we would choose His good, and seek after Him (Acts 17). But I never hear the young Earth creationists put forth this argument or anything like it.
This is the “Last Tuesday” paradox (there is no evidence that can rule out the idea that the universe was created last Tuesday, complete with traces of a non-existent past). Scientists dismiss this sort of ad-hoc notion, not because they can definitively disprove it (they can’t), but because it’s a useless dead end.