[unlearner]

“No, it was a perfectly good example which you chose to distort for reasons...? That term ‘modern horse’ could mean any horse, or even horse ancestor, in the past, say, million years. You will not find any such horse, or any horse-like creature in the Jurassic period, circa 175 million years ago.”

Supposing that the earth is billions of years old, the idea that life could have survived and thrived for billions or even hundreds of millions of years with no cataclysmic events that destroyed all life, would be MIRACULOUS.

A billion years. 175 million years. These numbers are deceptively simple because we know how to perform math on very large numbers. But this ability often distorts our perspective of reality.

Invoking numbers of this size for time and distance is akin to invoking God. These numbers give a false sense of confidence to those relying on them for interpreting prehistoric data. In practicality, they are incomprehensibly large and, from the perspective of a lifetime that is rarely more than a century, they are essentially infinite.

People, scientists in particular, feel comfortable working with approximations and extrapolations that can not be accurate within any degree of meaningful precision.

Just to prove a point, try doing an approximation of say a billion light years (or use parsecs if you prefer) by triangulating from the annual stellar parallax of the earth’s orbit around the sun (at the max of 6 months).

Let’s even pretend momentarily that there is no gravitational lensing caused by the gravity of stars and dark matter which we can not pinpoint. And pretend for a moment that we can effortlessly position our angle of view and exact position relative to the sun with greater than atomic precision.

It is still practically impossible to assert with any degree of confidence that we are detecting starlight from billions of lights years away.

And, yes, there are some creative and clever techniques to increase precision, but keep in mind that the claim of seeing starlight from billions of light years away has been made long before such techniques were invented.

Same applies to strata dating. “Jurassic era strata” is dated with these incredibly huge numbers that have no basis in reality. You simply cannot use radiometric dating to determine this because there is no absolute point or frame of reference. Radiometric dating does not even accurately measure rocks that have recently formed with known ages. Cataclysmic events, which are 100% certain to happen of spans of time this large, will completely alter such measurements.

In other words, even if we have a high degree of precision for measuring radioactive decay, it can not be used to accurately date the so-called Jurassic era strata.

More specifically, we can measure mass, volume, pressure, force, weight, and composition by DIRECT observation. But age can not be measured this way except for things that are very, very young.

There seems to be some confusion among TToE advocates when it comes to fact versus theory. Theories are explanations of facts. When such theories are very well supported and can be represented precisely with math, we call them laws. But neither theories nor laws are facts any more than saying the best ice cream flavor is chocolate fudge brownie. It may be a fact that it is MY favorite, but it is a categorical error to describe an opinion as a fact. Likewise, it is categorically wrong to conflate theory and fact. Facts are the observable data. And it might be appropriate to refer to a mathematic fact but, in actuality, math is only true if the axioms are true. That is, the real world is not necessarily bound to operate by mathematical models.

And what we call the “real” world is actually an abstraction of the mind. Scientific inquiry is limited to helping us more precisely understand that abstraction. As an example, we do not understand that the material world around us is made up of mostly empty space by merely looking at a coffee table with the naked eye. To our eyes it appears solid. Science helps us to understand that the materials of which the table is comprised are made of molecules, atoms, subatomic particles, etc. and empty space.

Science is not merely observing and interpreting data. John Wheeler, a Nobel physicist, said, “No phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon.” TToE can not explain abiogenesis OR the existence of the mind. Up until recently science had no theory of the mind at all. There are now two similar theories that are scientifically rigorous, testable, and falsifiable: biocentrism and conscious realism.

It is highly offensive that TToE advocates constantly slander creationists over the a priori assumption of a supernatural Creator, something even a child understands intuitively, yet they religiously affirm the validity of a theory that hinges on these two unsupported pillars: 1) abiogenesis and 2) mind being supposedly an emergent property of matter. I would personally consider billions of years to be in the same category, but at least there is a reasonable basis to assert such apparently long time spans. Time itself is an abstraction. We see this in the question of simultaneity. We see it in quantum entanglement. Because time is relative (time moves at different rates due to factors such as velocity, acceleration, and gravitation), the actual age of the universe is the age of what is the youngest rather than oldest. In other words, a young universe may contain an immense amount of time. This is not playing semantic games. In practical terms, the earth can only literally be billions of years old if it has traversed the sun billions of times.

In the evolution vs. creation debate, TToE has morphed from evolutionary theory to theory of everything. It’s ridiculous. It turns useful principles of science like natural selection into a multi-level-marketing-like Ponzi scheme. Nomenclature is not the same as explanatory power. Applying the concept of predictive power of a theory to prehistoric data turns the whole theory into a massive, non-stop shell game. Everything either “supports” the theory or nudges it slightly in a different direction. That’s not falsifiability, “modern horses” in the Jurassic notwithstanding.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

+1

“Nothing comes from nothing and nothing ever will.”

- Maria, The Sounf of Music (TSoM)

[BroJoeK]

Thanks, unlerner, for an interesting essay.
I'll take it as your own work, likely copied & pasted from previous efforts, which would explain why so much of it, however interesting, seems to have nothing to do with the subject under discussion.

unlerner: "Supposing that the earth is billions of years old, the idea that life could have survived and thrived for billions or even hundreds of millions of years with no cataclysmic events that destroyed all life, would be MIRACULOUS."

Of course it's miraculous, the entire Universe is miraculous, intelligently designed and, in a sense, irreducibly complex.
And one of the biggest miracles, imho, is that the Universe was created in such a manner that we, feeble minded as we are, can understand many, if not all, of its natural processes.
In other words, the assumptions of methodological naturalism provide us with a large and growing body of explanations with great predictive and utilitarian powers.

unlerner: "A billion years. 175 million years. These numbers are deceptively simple... "

If we were talking about dollars in your bank account, you'd be less cavalier about the differences in such numbers.

unlerner: "Just to prove a point, try doing an approximation of say a billion light years (or use parsecs if you prefer) by triangulating from the annual stellar parallax of the earth’s orbit..."

That's the wrong tool for such large distances.
It would be like trying to measure the distance from New York to LA with a yardstick.

unlerner: "It is still practically impossible to assert with any degree of confidence that we are detecting starlight from billions of lights years away."

Sure, using your little yardstick.
Fortunately there are other tools which work better at longer distances.

unlerner: "And, yes, there are some creative and clever techniques to increase precision, but keep in mind that the claim of seeing starlight from billions of light years away has been made long before such techniques were invented."

Not that I know of, but let's consider something closer, the Andromeda galaxy:

1. In 1785 William Hershel guessed at the distance to Andromeda as 2,000 times the distance to Sirius.
   That would make it 180,000 light-years, short by a factor of 100.

2. In 1917, Huber Curtis estimated the distance at 500,000 light-years based on the relative brightness of observed novae in Andromeda.
   He was only short by a factor of 5.

3. In 1922, Ernst Opik estimated 1.5 million light years based on the velocities of Andromeda stars.
   He was still short by a million light years.

4. In 1925, Edwin Hubble settled the debate at 2.5 million light years, based on the brightness of Cepheid variable stars.
   Hubble's calculation remains the accepted distance today.

My point is: over time new methods were found to calculate distances, each being effective under its own circumstances, but not necessarily others.

unlerner: "Same applies to strata dating. “Jurassic era strata” is dated with these incredibly huge numbers that have no basis in reality.
You simply cannot use radiometric dating to determine this because there is no absolute point or frame of reference."

Nonsense.
First of all, there are dozens of different methods for dating ancient materials, some of which involve radiometrics, others don't.
Some are as relatively simple as counting tree rings, or ice cores, or layers of minerals deposited on stalactites in caves.
Others are more complex, but when multiple methods are available for the same materials, and those methods produce similar results, then confidence increases.

unlerner: "Radiometric dating does not even accurately measure rocks that have recently formed with known ages. "

Only if the radiometric dating labs are provided with false or incomplete data about the materials to be dated.

"A young-Earth research group reported that they sent a rock erupted in 1980 from Mount Saint Helens volcano to a dating lab and got back a potassium-argon age of several million years.
This shows we should not trust radiometric dating."

No it only shows that science can be tricked by dishonest people.

unlerner: "In other words, even if we have a high degree of precision for measuring radioactive decay, it can not be used to accurately date the so-called Jurassic era strata."

Pure nonsense, especially when dozens of different methods are used to reconfirm datings of many geological strata.
When the same results come back time & again, confidence increases.

unlerner: "More specifically, we can measure mass, volume, pressure, force, weight, and composition by DIRECT observation.
But age can not be measured this way except for things that are very, very young."

But age can be measured directly by such things as tree rings, ice cores and mineral deposits in caves.
And when these direct measurements match up nicely with radiometric datings of similar materials, then confidence increases.

unlerner: "TToE can not explain abiogenesis OR the existence of the mind. "

Darwin's basic theory of evolution had nothing whatever to do with either abiogenesis or existence of mind.
So why are you rambling on incoherently?

unlerner: "It is highly offensive that TToE advocates constantly slander creationists over the a priori assumption of a supernatural Creator..."

Evolution theory says nothing about your a priori assumptions.
People who do slander religion generally are usually atheists pursuing political or social agendas, and whose knowledge of science is often woefully lacking.

unlerner: "they religiously affirm the validity of a theory that hinges on these two unsupported pillars: 1) abiogenesis and 2) mind being supposedly an emergent property of matter."

Again, nothing in Darwin's basic evolution theory says anything about either of those so I repeat: why are you rambling incoherently?

unlerner: " a young universe may contain an immense amount of time.
This is not playing semantic games."

Of course it is. Get a grip, focus, make your point.

unlerner: "In the evolution vs. creation debate, TToE has morphed from evolutionary theory to theory of everything.
It’s ridiculous."

What's ridiculous is your claim that "evolutionary theory" "morphed" to "theory of everything".
What are you drinking?
What are you smoking?
Get rid of it right now!

unlerner: "Everything either “supports” the theory or nudges it slightly in a different direction.
That’s not falsifiability, “modern horses” in the Jurassic notwithstanding."

What's falsifiable is just what I said in the beginning: you will not find any kind of horse fossils from the Jurassic era, about 175 million years ago.
Indeed, the first pre-horse-like fossils do not appear until millions of years after dinosaurs disappeared 65 million years ago.