Evolution: What is it? (long article)

Information Central ^ | Craig McClarren

[Heartlander]

For the record, I am Heartlander and no one else. There can only be one…

Oops, that’s Highlander.

[longshadow]

No, I'm Sparticus!

Here we go again.....

BTW, to correct my spelling mistake in the original post, it's: "Spartacus"

[AndrewC]

I've been accused of being the same poster as a "cornelis" with whom I have had many conversations.

Many factors go into such a judgement. And cornelis posts more than sporadically and conveniently.

[Nebullis]

Many factors go into such a judgement.

Besides paranoia? No-Kin is a rather transparent fake.

Perhaps it's a moral lapse on my part, but I don't particularly care who's playing No-Kin. I'm actually quite amused at how seriously the accusation of double identities was taken and by how seriously it was pursued.

[netman]

view>source> Which is the recent aberration? Old-Earth or Young-Earth Belief?

Which is the recent aberration?
Old-Earth or Young-Earth Belief?
by Don Batten

Subsequently published in:
Creation 24(1):24–27
December 2001 – February 2002

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AiG takes the stand that the creation is thousands of years old, based on straight-forward acceptance of the chronology in Genesis.

Churchian critics accept the billions of years touted today and claim that the ‘young-Earth’ view is a recent invention of Protestant ‘fundamentalist’ churches. They claim that various Church Fathers or other ancient authorities wrote things that suggested they did not hold a ‘young-Earth’ view.

A point-by-point rebuttal to the erroneous long age, local flood, soul-less pre-human hominid compromises of Hugh Ross!

Creation and Time: A Report on the Progressive Creationist Book by Hugh RossMark Van Bebber &
Paul Taylor

This exhaustively researched book on the theological ramifications of Hugh Ross’s ‘progressive creationist’ teaching is a wake-up call to all Christians concerned about Biblical inerrancy and the terrible divisiveness that erroneous theological beliefs can cause! 127 pages.

(High School–Adult)

See some online chapters

More info/Purchase online

However, the claims about the church fathers and Reformers have been shown to be wrong, as shown in the rebuttal to the long-ager Hugh Ross by Mark Van Bebber and Paul Taylor (right). It’s also vital to analyse what they actually say instead of what people claim they say — see Did early Church leaders and reformers believe the literal creation account given in Genesis?

One problem is that sometimes a non-specific statement about creation is misinterpreted as claiming that they didn’t have a position on the days and time frame, obviously the fallacy of arguing from silence. It’s worse when clear statements about the Creation days and time frame are ignored in favor of non-specific ones. The correct practice is to interpret the nonspecific passages by the specific ones. Note that, by the same methodology, someone hundreds of years in the future could find articles by every AiG writer that are not specific on days or the time frame and, by ignoring their clear statements elsewhere, claim that we don’t have any position on the issues!

Even Augustine cannot remotely be used in support of old-Earth beliefs, even though he allegorized the days of creation (and lots of other passages — he was no Hebrew scholar). The problem is, he tried to compress the days into an instant, which is diametrically opposite to what long-agers claim!

Furthermore, when ancient chronologies are researched, we find that many cultures, not just those based directly on the Bible, attest to an age of the Creation of thousands of years. It seems that no serious scholar believed in the old Earth fashion of today. It is very much a modernist invention.

The following comes from Young’s Analytical Concordance to the Holy Bible, first published in 1879. Under ‘Creation’, Young listed dates of Creation compiled by a Dr William Hales in 1830, who was an expert in chronology, from varied sources. None of them give a date of Creation of more than 9,000 years ago. Note that dates of Creation from various non-Christian / non-Jewish sources (India, Egypt, China, pre-Christian Greece, Babylonia, etc.) all testify to an age of thousands of years. Furthermore, both Catholic and Protestant scholars agreed on this issue. It seems that no serious chronologist believed in an old Earth.

Many of the scholars listed in this table made the chronology of the world a life-long study involving meticulous cross-matching of ancient records (many of which are not available to us today). These scholars did not obtain these dates by throwing dice! It is only the arrogance of modern man that dismisses this tradition of careful scholarship.

We must underline again the importance of this issue. The old earth advocates accept the recent claim that the Earth is billions of years old. This ‘age’ is based on radioactive dating. The same ‘dating’ puts the age of fossilized dead animals at up to hundreds of millions of years before people appeared on the scene. These fossils show evidence of violence and suffering (cancer and arthritis can be seen in the fossils, for example) — see Genesis: the Curse. So in the old earth schemes, all this death and suffering was going on when God created Adam and Eve and pronounced everything as ‘very good’ (Genesis 1:31). Hardly!

The Bible clearly teaches that the bad things came into being when Adam and Eve rejected the rule of the Creator over His creatures and the curse of death came into effect (Genesis 3:17–19, Romans 8:20–22, etc.). And because of this true history of the world, Jesus, the ‘last Adam’, came into the world to die for the sinful descendants of the first Adam (Romans 5:12 ff., 1 Cor. 15:21–22,45).

No, all attempts to marry the Bible with the old earth view actually undermine the Gospel.

Date of Creation

(from Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Holy Bible, 1879
8^th Edition, 1939 — entry under ‘Creation’)

‘Dr Hales, in his work entitled, “A New Analysis of Chronology and Geography, History and Prophecy,” (vol. 1, p. 210 [published in 1830]), remarks: “In every system of chronology, sacred and profane, the two grand eras — of the Creation of the World, and of the Nativity of Christ — have been usually adopted as standards, by reference to which all subordinate epochs, eras and periods have been adjusted.” He gives a list of 120 dates, commencing B.C. 6984, and terminating BC 3616, to which this event has been assigned by different authorities, and he admits that it might be swelled to 300. He places it at BC 5411. The date commonly adopted is BC 4004; being that of Ussher, Spanheim, Calmet, Blair, etc., and the one used in the English Bible [KJV].’

‘The following are some of the principal variations:’ (notations regarding dates of compilation or publication, extra information on sources, etc., have been added by AiG).

Source of Creation Date	Authority	Date BC
Alfonso X (Spain, 1200s)	Muller	6984
Alfonso X (Spain, 1200s)	Strauchius, Gyles1 1632–1682	6484
India	Gentil, French astronomer c.1760	6204
India	Arab records	6174
Babylonia	Bailly, John Silvain (French astronomer, 1736–1793)	6158
China	Bailly	6157
Diogenes Laertius (Greece 3rd Cent.)	Playfair	6138
Egypt	Bailly	6081
Septuagint (LXX)2	Albufaragi	5586
Josephus (1st Century Jew)	Playfair	5555
Septuagint, Alexandrine	Scaliger, Joseph (French classical scholar,1540–1609)	5508
Persia	Bailly	5507
Chronicle of Axum, Abyssinian	Bruce (1700s)	5500
Josephus	Jackson	5481
Jackson		5426
Hales		5411
Josephus	Hales	5402
India	Megasthenes,3 Greek historian (c. 340–282 bc)	5369
Talmudists	Petrus Alliacens	5344
Septuagint, Vatican		5270
Bede (673–735)	Strauchius	5199
Josephus	Univ. Hist.	4698
Samaritan computation	Scaliger	4427
Samaritan text	Univ. Hist.	4305
Hebrew (Masoretic) text		4161
Playfair and Walker		4008
Ussher, Spanheim, Calmet, Blair, etc.		4004
Kepler (Astronomer, 1571–1630)	Playfair	3993
Petavius (France, 1583–1652)		3984
Melanchthon (Reformer, 1500s)	Playfair	3964
Luther (Reformer, 1500s)		3961
Lightfoot		3960
Cornelius a Lapide	Univ. Hist.	3951
Scaliger, Isaacson		3950
Strauchius		3949
Vulgar Jewish computation	Strauchius	3760
Rabbi Lipman (1579–1654)	Univ. Hist.	3616

Notes

1. Brevarium Chronologicum Book IV, 3^rd edition, 1699 in English. Return to text.

2. The Greek translation of the Old Testament originally published in Egypt BC. Return to text.

3. A Greek historian from Iona, he was Ambassador to India for King Seleucus I. He published Indika in four books. Return to text.

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COPYRIGHT © 2002 Answers in Genesis Ministries International
www.AnswersInGenesis.org

[PatrickHenry]

I've been accused of being the same poster as a "cornelis" with whom I have had many conversations. By PatrickHenry, no less. Or was it jennyp? And this without humor.

I remember the incident perfectly well. And the events leading up to it. I never expressed my suspicions in any open thread. Or to you or "cornelis" privately. This is very interesting.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

But then you catch him on another thread, same old act in progress.

Its an evolved trait.

[VadeRetro]

I never expressed my suspicions in any open thread. Or to you or "cornelis" privately. This is very interesting.

Are they reading your thoughts? Don't mess with tinfoil! Just do like I do and keep your mind a blank.

[Nebullis]

I never expressed my suspicions in any open thread.

I know. Freepmail paranoia is rampant as well. I learned my lesson well and keep my correspondence on the board, except for an occasional reference or clarification.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

That's not a brontosaurus, its a triskeles. It was drawn by Odysseus during his voyage.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

I'm NOT Sparticus!

[<1/1,000,000th%]

You left out Origen.

[VadeRetro]

From your Halton Arp link:

A prime example is the galaxy pair shown at the right. The larger galaxy (M51) in this pair of galaxies is obviously physically connected to its small companion galaxy. The redshift value of the small companion is vastly greater than the redshift of the larger (parent) galaxy. Mainstream astronomers presently are either ignoring this fact or denying that there is any physical connection between the larger and smaller members of the pair. They say the high redshift companion must be "well behind" its parent (because of this difference in their redshift values). That they are obviously physically connected is claimed to be an "illusion".

Then there's the matter of the number of light-absorbing hydrogen clouds in front of each, a matter determined by the Lyman-Alpha forest in the spectra. Inevitably, the most red-shifted object has the greatest number of distinct hydrogen clouds in the way.

[Junior]

Oddly enough, it wasn't evolutionists (or even biologists) who first postulated an ancient Earth. It was geologists, beginning somewhere around the 18th century, who figured the Earth was far older than a few thousand years.

BTW, a Jewish rabbi writing during the Middle Ages, pegged the age of the universe at 15 billion years, simply using the information available in Scripture.

[longshadow]

I'm NOT Sparticus!

Prove it!

;-)

[Nebullis]

BTW, a Jewish rabbi writing during the Middle Ages, pegged the age of the universe at 15 billion years, simply using the information available in Scripture.

Young earth dates are spuriously ascribed to the Bible when it contains no clear chronology, right? I know there are some serious problems with Kings and Chronicles. Begat can mean anything from father to ancester.

[Heartlander]

Source please...

[AndrewC]

I'm actually quite amused at how seriously the accusation of double identities was taken and by how seriously it was pursued.

In an environment such as this, it is of prime importance that information is trustworthy. If this truly is a game, I've better things to do. If this is just a juvenile namecalling, and shouting match it would not matter who imitated whom, but since I don't consider this a game I do care that people be honest. I also believe that honest people try to adhere to the standards established for a venue namely----

Don't play games - Don't represent yourself as another person, create or use another screen name to avoid a revocation of posting privileges, misrepresent the site or your role in it, and don't misattribute a contribution you've made. (Parody exceptions would apply to the latter, of course, but it should be clear what you are doing.)

[medved]

Sounds like an admission that things other than distance and rate of recession can account for redshift differences to me...

[longshadow]

Re: Arp's redshift refutation:

=========================================

Title:		Combinatorics and companion galaxies: Paradox lost
Authors:		Newman, William I.; Terzian, Yervant
Affiliation:		AAUniv. of California, Los Angeles, CA, US ABCornell Univ., Ithaca, NY, US
Journal:		Astrophysical Journal, Part 1 (ISSN 0004-637X), vol. 441, no. 2, p. 505-506 (ApJ Homepage)
Publication Date:		03/1995
Category:		Astrophysics
Origin:		STI
NASA/STI Keywords:		COMBINATORIAL ANALYSIS, GALACTIC CLUSTERS, INTERACTING GALAXIES, RED SHIFT, DISTANCE, PROBABILITY THEORY, SAMPLING
Bibliographic Code:		1995ApJ...441..505N

Abstract

Arp (1994) has presented redshift data for the Local Group of galaxies and for the next major group, whose largest galaxies are M31 and M81, respectively. He observed that the relative redshifts of all 22 of their companions were positive and claimed that the likelihood that this would occur is 1 in 4 x 106. We show using the classical combinatoric paradigm of ordered samples (without replacement) that the correct probability for the dominant member of each cluster to possess the lowest observed redshift is approximately 8%.

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