To go along with my Flood Models information, I thought I would take a look at the model of a 6000 year old earth and universe that is the basis of YEC beliefs. This is based on the calculations Ussher made in the mid 1600s based on the chronology of the people and events as written in the bible. For more information on Ussher, http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/ussher.htm
Usshers figures make the earth around 6006 years old (as the first day of creation is given as Oct 23rd 4004 BC) and the flood around 4352 years ago. So Ussher’s dates put creation on 4004 BC and the flood around 2349 BC.

I want to go over a few of the problems with these dates, some common creationist answers to the problems and a response to the answers.

Problems:

• Tree ring Data.
- The oldest living tree found so far is "Methuselah," a Bristlecone Pine that is 4,768 years old. This is around 416 years older than the date of the supposed global flood.
- None of the trees in that area (or other areas) show signs of a massive flood catastrophe in their tree rings around the same time.
- The bristlecone Pine rings have been dated back around 9,000 years. 3,000 years older than the date of creation.
For more information about the Bristlecone Pine and Tree Ring dating: http://www.sonic.net/bristlecone/intro.html

•Creationist Responses to Tree ring data.
1) Appearance of age theory says that the trees could have been created with multiple tree rings already intact, making them appear older than they really are.
2) Trees can grow two tree rings in a year, instead of just one. Making the trees appear older than they really are.

•Response to creationists.
1) If we are using the bible here, we have two different sets of evidence. It says in,
“Gen 1:12   And the earth brought forth grass, [and] herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed [was] in itself, after his kind: and God saw that [it was] good.” Based on this, we would assume that the trees were created with rings. However it says in, “Gen 2:5   And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and [there was] not a man to till the ground.” Based on this we would assume that the first trees and plants grew after creation and would not have extra rings. Contradicting evidence in the bible, however, we can say that even if there were tree rings created into the trees, there wouldn’t be enough to make the tree rings match Ussher’s dates. As even 100 years of original tree rings would not change the dates to match. Read more about the Appearance of age theory below.
2) Trees can also not grow a ring. However trees don’t all add or lose a ring at the same time. By getting many samples and cross checking them, the False rings can be ruled out and a more accurate date can be found. The more an area is researched, the less likely false rings will pose a problem to the date.

•Creosote Bush
- The oldest living bush in the world is the “King Clone” creosote bush in southern California. It is believed to be 11,000 years old. It is possible that they have found a creosote bush that is even older.

•Radiometric Dating.
- Many different types of Radiometric dating has been used that show many things to be older than 6,000 years. From Carbon 14 dating to K/Ar dating, there are many and they match with other non radiometric methods. Here is a Radiometric Resource List.

•Creationist Responses to Radiometric dating.
1) The Radiometric dating method is flawed.
2) The Radiometric dating method has been changed by the flood.

•Response to creationists.
1) Each different type of radiometric dating does have its limitations. Many people who use them know this and know when to use them and when not to use them. Many times when creationist groups claim a dating method is “flawed” they have used it wrong. One example is AIG using K/Ar dating to date a new lava flow. K/Ar dating is known to give bad results on new lava flows. This is known and is taken into account when K/Ar is being used to date things. AIG apparently ignored this and then pretended that this proves K/Ar as being a bad dating method. An Example of them giving half information about C-14 dating can be found here, Creationist in Conflict.
2) Unfortunately there is no evidence that this flood happened. I also haven’t got an answer to how a flood can distort different radiometric data by equal amounts, so that they all line up, even though radiometric readings would take different processes to distort them.

•Flood Problems.
- The flood is important to creationism, as it is often used to explain the reason for getting data that doesn’t fit with a 6000 year old earth. However it has many problems of its own, to keep this thread shorter, they can be seen here: Flood Models.

•Lack of flood History.
-Both the Egyptian and Chinese civilizations (among many others) were around in 2349 B.C. Neither of these civilizations recorded a global flood.
-Besides the fact that if the flood happened as it is said, we should see these thriving civilizations just drop out of existence. But on the contrary they moved through the flood date without any change in their civilizations by a catastrophic disaster.

•Old Civilizations.
- Civilizations existed before 4004 B.C. Which should be impossible if its the date of creation.
- Around 1,400 years before the date of creation, around 5400 B.C. Mesopotamia had Irrigation.


•Hyper Evolution.
- Many creationists believe that Noah only took “kinds” of animals onto the ark and that they micro evolved into what we see now. The problem with this is that if there have only been around 4352 years ago, this micro evolution would have to happen at an enormous rate. A type of Hyper evolution that happened in a very short amount of time to all animals. There should be lots of different records and evidence of this hyper micro evolution happening to every animal on the planet at the same time.
-For more information of what we should see if this form of Hyper evolution was true for all animals see Creationism As Science.

•The Appearance of Age Theory.
As was mentioned earlier The Appearance of Age Theory says that the universe was created to appear older than it really is. This cant be proven or disproven, we cant find any evidence to support it or falsify it. It is in the realm of philosophy, not science. It also can be used against christianity as much as it can be used for it. Since after all, the universe could be 5 minutes old, and our memories are faked or the universe could have been created 1 Billion years ago, making both science and the bible wrong. There is no evidence for any of the dates, or the “theory” in general. The bible does say that, “1Cr 14:33   For God is not [the author] of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints. “ Since god is the author of creation, according to this he should not have put false data in the earth to create confusion.Other Biblical scholars have come up with other dates for creation and the flood. Some have moved dates to match history a bit more. One example is Joshua's conquest of Canaan, Ussher puts it around 1451 B.C. The Egyptians were at peak power around this time. However, Egypt was weak around 1237 B.C. And some believe that this was more likely the time the Joshua conquered Canaan. However Ussher’s calculations still remain to be some of the more accurate calculations of the dates and information in the bible.

This is just a small list of some of the problems with a 6006 year old earth/universe.

-Ari

Last Update 8/10/03

©03 Ari

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