Where did the idea of “millions of years” come from?

AiG ^ | Terry Mortenson

[GodGunsGuts]

Where did the idea of “millions of years” come from?

All of our media outlets push evolution and “millions of years” ideas on the public. Even children’s cartoons reflect evolutionary philosophy! In an episode of the cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants, entitled “SpongeBob B.C.,” the narrator begins: “Ah, dawn breaks over the primordial sea. It is here that millions of years ago, life began taking its first clumsy steps out of the darkness, opening its newly formed eyeballs to stare into the blinding light of intelligence.” Unfortunately, large segments of the church have swallowed the millions-of-years evolutionary history hook, line, and sinker. But it was not always this way. In this chapter, we will discover where the idea of millions of years came from and why the church went along with it. We will see that science does not require it, but rather it is a necessity of uniformitarian geology and evolutionary theory...

[tacticalogic]

Fair enough. Who’s deciding what constitutes “powerful” and “flimsy”?

[Nephi]

My wife and I once saw an interview with Frank Libby in which he acknowledged that carbon 14 dating objects can be affected by the absorbtion of the surrounding carbon.

The Mt St Helens eruption destroyed three widely accepted beliefs regarding the time required for the formation of certain phenomenon.

First, due to the sudden melting of snow and ice, a canyon was formed instantly that would’ve been estimated to have required thousands of years to form.

The trees that were felled into Spirit lake over time became water logged and popped up vertical. Over time as the verticle trees floated towards the shores and the sentiment in the lake settled around the trees, in effect, transplanting them and setting the stage for a petrified forest.

I believe the last phenomenon had to do with the overnight formation of what could eventually become peat beds.

In summary, Mt St Helens showed us that we didn’t know what we thought we knew.

[dirtboy]

How about you tell me the depositional environment? Some formations can form quite quickly. That, however, does not mean that ALL formations form quickly. Ergo, the problem with your ‘logic’.

[BillT]

Come on now, are you only allowed to look at one theory of the column columns.

Every culture on the planet has a floor story at the beginning; this does not prove the Noahdic flood but does allow for it.

If the entire world was covered with water all tore up from the fountains beneath and the clouds above, how would the sediment settle?

I think that the layers are caused by the settling of heavier pieces first. This also would explain the few areas where a petrified tree spanned multiple layers.

Science is observable = consensus is not science.

[Fiji Hill]

How do “young earth” creationists explain the existence of objects in space, such as quasars, that are located tens of billions of light years from the earth?

[dirtboy]

I think that the layers are caused by the settling of heavier pieces first.

Not consistent with the geological column - how do you get terrestial dune sandstones between marine shales and limestones?

[dirtboy]

The draining of an inland sea could have formed the Grand Canyon in a week

I'm not even talking about the formation of the canyon - I am talking about the formation of the geological column of the canyon. That simply cannot be explained by a Young Earth model.

[Pharmboy]

Ahhh...after all these years, I finally get your handle: you are a geologist and not a dirt-biker!

[GodGunsGuts]

==How about you tell me the depositional environment? Some formations can form quite quickly. That, however, does not mean that ALL formations form quickly. Ergo, the problem with your ‘logic’.

So you admit that massive sedimentary formations can form "quite quickly." That's good, because the Grand Canyon was formed "quite quickly" as well.

Here is the answer to your question:

Figure 2: Fine layering was produced within hours at Mt St Helens on June 12, 1980 by hurricane velocity surging flows from the crater of the volcano. The 25-foot thick (7.6 m), June 12 deposit is exposed in the middle of the cliff. It is overlain by the massive, but thinner, March 19,1982 mudflow deposit, and is underlain by the air-fall debris from the last hours of the May 18, 1980, nine-hour eruption.

http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/1541/

[dirtboy]

Actually, that, and veggie gardening, along with a play on my first name.

[GodGunsGuts]

That actually appears as though it formed quite rapidly, don’t you think?

[dirtboy]

So you admit that massive sedimentary formations can form "quite quickly." That's good, because the Grand Canyon was formed "quite quickly" as well.

Once again, because one formation formed quickly, it does not mean others form at the same rate of speed. Please explain how the Flood could have formed this reef limestone formation. We know how fast corals grow from modern observations of the Great Barrier Reef.

[dirtboy]

That actually appears as though it formed quite rapidly

"Appearances" does not equal science. We can study the rate of terrestial dune sandstone formations in deserts around the world. You know, REAL science. Done with the sweat and labors of actual scientists.

[TommyDale]

That would explain all the prehistoric discoveries.

[LiteKeeper]

SITREP

[jimmyray]

How do “young earth” creationists explain the existence of objects in space, such as quasars, that are located tens of billions of light years from the earth?

If the universe is only 14.7 billion years old, how can you possibly see objects that are located tens of billions of light years from the earth?

[Alkhin]

No no - while I agree with your statement as a whole, would like to say that carbon dating is ONLY used for organic material and data gets wildly skewed beyond a certain time period ie 10,000. Many of the fossils of dinosaurs have been metamorphized into minerals/rock...and carbon dating does not work for dating minerals. Just a quibble I have...look more for the Potassium-argon dating and other radioactive techniques. Carbon-dating is more useful and provides more exact dating for the whole of human history, which, in geological terms is only 2 million years, a thumbnail length compared to what has gone on before.

[Polybius]

Tell me dirtboy, how long did it take to form the following sedimenary layers?

A. If the layers are devoid of any sign of fossil deposits, they could be laid down in a single day by ash from volcanic activity.

B. If every layer has identical fossil deposits from exactly the same biological ecosystem (say, late 20th Century Washington State), they could have been laid down in a single week of floods.

C. If the layers each contains fossil deposits different from the other layers and from different biological eras, it could have taken thousands of years or millions of years depending on how deep the layers are.

Many old earth myths were destroyed with Mt St Helens

No, they were not.

If you excavate the layers at Mount St. Helens back to the pre-ereuption level, you will find nothing other than A and B. You will not find a single fossil of, say, a saber tooth tiger or a mastodon or even a buffalo that might have roamed Washington State before the white man killed them off in the 1800's.

ALL you will find will be biological deposits found in the ecosystem of the late 20th Century in that particular portion of Washington State. And maybe a Ford Pinto.

[Alkhin]

Oh wow - where is that at??? Thats beautiful stone!!

[dirtboy]

And maybe a Ford Pinto.

Talk about a species that deserved to go extinct.