[_ Old Earth _] Evidence for an old earth

[Crying Rock]

CR tosses in his two cents:

I think this whole argument, all sides, miss the the real point: there is no absolute time.

Einstein:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitatio ... e_dilation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame-dragging

http://www2.physics.umd.edu/~yakovenk/t ... orentz.pdf

http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/einsteinlig ... lation.htm

 

[Barbarian]

Do you have any arguments you understand well enough to present them to us?

 

[Crying Rock]

Do you have any arguments you understand well enough to present them to us?

If you don't understand what I quoted then it's probably beyond you're intelligence.

Have faith in Einstein. He was fairly smart. ;)

 

[Barbarian]

I suspected you didn't understand them, because you merely linked them, without any attempt to present an argument yourself.

If you do, perhaps you can summarize the argument of one of these, and the evidence for it?

If not, perhaps you should start with something you do understand. At very least, arguing by links is rather ineffective. If you do it, you might want to post the most important passages with your explanation as to what it means.

 

[Crying Rock]

I suspected you didn't understand them, because you merely linked them, without any attempt to present an argument yourself.

If you do, perhaps you can summarize the argument of one of these, and the evidence for it?

If not, perhaps you should start with something you do understand. At very least, arguing by links is rather ineffective. If you do it, you might want to post the most important passages with your explanation as to what it means.

Negate that absolute time doesn't exist.

I didn't expect that you would understand the mathematical equations. Very few do.

However, the equations aren't necessary to argue the point.

 

[VenomFangX]

It takes more than emotional feelings that you are correct and inspirational songs to state what "the truth" is. The fact is and it is a true fact within certain parameters that the Universe is 14 billion years old and the Earth and Solar system is 4.65 billion years old. That is Gods Universe: the same God that gave us intelligence so he could reveal it to us.
yours

ÒõýþüäðýóÖ gold

 

[lordkalvan]

CR tosses in his two cents:

I think this whole argument, all sides, miss the the real point: there is no absolute time.

I think we're talking about a particular frame of reference in the context of our own experiences of space-time which are not directly subject to relativistic effects. Given our points of reference, it is possible to argue for and present evidence concerning the age of Earth; it is certainly possible to present evidence that supports arguments against a 6,000-years old Earth.

 

[lordkalvan]

It takes more than emotional feelings that you are correct and inspirational songs to state what "the truth" is. The fact is and it is a true fact within certain parameters that the Universe is 14 billion years old and the Earth and Solar system is 4.65 billion years old. That is Gods Universe: the same God that gave us intelligence so he could reveal it to us.

I think your last comment goes to the heart of the matter: if God created humanity, he gave us inquiring minds for a purpose. If our inquiring minds lead us into an investigation of the nature of the Universe, this is how we can best understand creation. Pre-scientific ideas expressed in ways that might make sense to a pre-literate. superstitious culture have no meaningful contribution to make to our understanding of the cosmos.

 

[Barbarian]

If creationism depends on "it's all relative, and there is no objective truth", then what good is it?

 

[Sparkey]

I think your last comment goes to the heart of the matter: if God created humanity, he gave us inquiring minds for a purpose. If our inquiring minds lead us into an investigation of the nature of the Universe, this is how we can best understand creation. Pre-scientific ideas expressed in ways that might make sense to a pre-literate. superstitious culture have no meaningful contribution to make to our understanding of the cosmos.

Please define your use of the words, "literate" and "pre-literate" for me, preferable in a way that does not change the meaning of the word or its inflected forms as they are commonly used.

[Middle English litterate, from Latin littertus, from littera, ltera, letter; see letter.]
liter·ate·ly adv.
liter·ate·ness n.

Usage Note: For most of its long history in English, literate has meant only "familiar with literature," or more generally, "well-educated, learned." Only since the late 19th century has it also come to refer to the basic ability to read and write. Its antonym illiterate has an equally broad range of meanings: an illiterate person may be incapable of reading a shopping list or unable to grasp an allusion to Shakespeare or Keats.

The term functional illiterate is often used to describe a person who can read or write to some degree, but below a minimum level required to function in even a limited social situation or job setting. An aliterate person, by contrast, is one who is capable of reading and writing but who has little interest in doing so, whether out of indifference to learning in general or from a preference for seeking information and entertainment by other means. ·

More recently, the meanings of the words literacy and illiteracy have been extended from their original connection with reading and literature to any body of knowledge. For example, "geographic illiterates" cannot identify the countries on a map, and "computer illiterates" are unable to use a word-processing system. All of these uses of literacy and illiteracy are acceptable.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

I'm not trying to be the grammar police here but think instead that your statement shows your ignorance of the richness found in the culture and time you reference. Are you trying to say that those who wrote the Bible could neither read nor write? Are you trying to say that they were functional illiterates or aliterate? It seems to me that your depiction and characterization of the writers of the Bible constitute yet another ad hominem attack and hence speaks more of you than "them". Ad hominem attacks on one's opponent are a tried-and-true strategy for people who have a case that is weak.

lordkalvan, you've asked: "You think I am a Ph.D geologist?"
My reply: "No."

 

[VenomFangX]

your statement shows your ignorance of the richness found in the culture and time you reference

I am sure the culture predating Greek Civilisation was rich, no doubt to some aspect inspired by the Mesopotamians and the ancient Egyptians, however, their language was ancient and certainly not English, Russian, Germanic or any of the other modern languages; to me it seems likely something is definately lost in translation, when you go back to the articles in the Torah which the old testament is based upon to some degree.
It is fair that you discuss the literacy of the period and try and cross the bridge through time and space till now, but then the thread of the discussion has changed depicting that an ad hominem attack was made on the authors. If it was said that the arguments or scriptures of the ancient authors were incorrect simply because they did not use modern day soap or we did not like their beards, that is ad hominem as it is off the argument. As the argument is about the ability to write with the same linguistic ability and with the same intellectual literacy that as we might do today is not ad hominem at all, it is about the ability to write, clearly and coherently.
yours
ÒõýþüäðýóÖ

 

[Sparkey]

You're making a very basic mistake here, Venom; the ability to translate is not the same as the ability to write.

Read the translation by Edward Fox called "The Five Books of Moses" and try to say that. I must disagree with you in the strongest terms if you cast yourself in with those who call the Hebrew in the Pentateuch "illiterate" in any sense. Where do you get such ideas anyway?

Here then are just a few of the reviews of "The Five Books of Moses" (by Everett Fox):

Based on the Buber-Rosenzweig translation of the Hebrew Bible, completed in 1960, Fox's new rendering of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy is a breathtaking translation that captures the beautiful, majestic, and dynamic character of biblical Hebrew. In his translation, Fox (Jewish studies, Clark Univ.) lovingly caresses the language of the Bible so that readers may listen to it as it was heard and read by its earliest Jewish audience. Listen, for example, to his rendering of Exodus 3:14, the encounter between God and Moses: "God said to Moshe:/Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh/I will be-there howsoever I will be there." Fox provides keen and insightful notes and commentary, and the introductions to each book are crisp and fresh. The Five Books of Moses demonstrates the living character of scripture in the modern world. An essential purchase for all libraries.
Henry L. Carrigan Jr., Westerville P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"A binding religious text, a historical document of the first importance, and a work of great literary imagination." --Edward Hirsch

"Fox's translation has the rare virtue of making constantly visible in English the Hebraic quality of the original, challenging preconceptions of what the Bible is really like. A bracing protest against the bland modernity of all the recent English versions of the Bible." --Robert Alter, professor of comparative literature, University of California, Berkeley

"No serious Bible reader--whether Jewish, Christian, or secular--can afford to ignore this volume." --Jon D. Levenson, Harvard Divinity School

But don't take their word for it, read a selected portion ---------> HERE <----------
Open the link and scroll down to the box that is an expert from Genesis 22. See for yourself.

Consider also that this book (the Christian Bible) even in the cruder rendering from the 15th century is the one of the best sellers (if not the best seller) of all time. Illiterate? Hardly. Bible Gateway has this to say, "The Authorized Version, or King James Version, quickly became the standard for English-speaking Protestants. Its flowing language and prose rhythm has had a profound influence on the literature of the past 300 years."

One of the things that I do regret about the Authorized Version (KJV) was that Bishop Ussher's 6,000 year timetable was published therein (in fact, until the 1970s, the Bibles placed in nearly every hotel room by the Gideon Society carried his chronology) and has been widely accepted as the Word of God itself. This has nothing to do with the actual words inspired by the Holy Spirit though. James Ussher also alleged that the pope was the Antichrist. Per Doug Linder's statement, (published on the The University of Missouri-Kansas City website) "paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould points out in an essay on Ussher, the bishop’s calculation of the date of Creation fueled much ridicule from scientists who pointed to him as “a symbol of ancient and benighted authoritarianism.â€Â


~Sparhawk

PS - I came back to this thread with the intent of deleting my post because I regretted the possibility of stirring up another side discussion only to find that I was too late. Pardon me if you would. Carry on.

 

[VenomFangX]

No I have not made a mistake: I did not say they had anarchic abilities at all. However, our understanding of the documents is the ability to accurately translate, not only the literal meaning but the intentional meaning. I should know as I find it hard to translate Russian to English properly when asked. Boris Pasternak found the same issues when he and others tried to translate Ãâ€Ã¾ÃºÑ‚þр Öøòðóþ (Dr Zhivago) into legible English; the beautiful poetry simply cannot be done.
I think with the scriptures there was a similar problem.
yours
ÒõýþüäýóÖ

 

[Sparkey]

No I have not made a mistake: I did not say they had anarchic abilities at all. However, our understanding of the documents is the ability to accurately translate, not only the literal meaning but the intentional meaning. I should know as I find it hard to translate Russian to English properly when asked. Boris Pasternak found the same issues when he and others tried to translate Ãâ€Ã¾ÃºÑ‚þр Öøòðóþ (Dr Zhivago) into legible English; the beautiful poetry simply cannot be done.
I think with the scriptures there was a similar problem.
yours
ÒõýþüäðýóÖ

Can you read German? I can't - and it would be better said of me that I'm illiterate than to suggest such a thing of the ones the Holy Spirit chose as His pen. Still, I ask because maybe you've read Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig, Die Schrift und ihre Verdeutschung (Berlin: Schocken Verlag, 1936). An English translation has been published as Scripture and Translation, edited and translated by Lawrence Rosenwald and Everett Fox (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994).

When you used the word "anarchic" did you mean "of, like, or tending to anarchy" or maybe you meant to use a different word? Perhaps you meant "archaic"? I do take your meaning though. I also note that you have stated, "the argument is about the ability to write with the same linguistic ability and with the same intellectual literacy that as we might do today is not ad hominem at all, it is about the ability to write, clearly and coherently."

lordkalvan is specifically addressing the issue as it applies to our understanding of the cosmos and I object to his characterization of those men of God as illiterate or pre-literate or that they were in any way functional illiterates or aliterate. The only point of that attack was to demean the authors and did nothing to address the statements found in the bible. I'm fairly certain that he will admit to having said, "the bible is not a science book," or something to that effect in the past.


~Sparrow

 

[VenomFangX]

I have to agree, the holy scriptures are not science documents and never were intended to be; the world and the knowledge we have today is vastly different, since the the documents were delivered to us, chemistry, physics and other unknown realms have been opened up to us: this is indeed a gift.
Providing I do not try and see the holy bible as a science document but what it is a divine inspiration from the Lord I have no problems. If the Cosmos is 14 billion years old that is not what science dictates; science only gathers the information, that Cosmos is Gods work.
ÒõýþüäðýóÖ

 

[lordkalvan]

Please define your use of the words, "literate" and "pre-literate" for me, preferable in a way that does not change the meaning of the word or its inflected forms as they are commonly used.

Literate = able to read and write. Pre-literate = not yet using writing as a cultural medium.

The Old Testament is generally regarded as derived from an oral tradition, subsequently written down by a literate elite. Most individuals in the Middle East of antiquity would have been functionally illiterate.

I'm not trying to be the grammar police here but think instead that your statement shows your ignorance of the richness found in the culture and time you reference.

Preliterate is a descriptive word and is not a value-judgement. Why would you suppose I would regard a culture as lacking in richness simply because most members of the culture could not read or write? The Indian cultures of North America had no written language before the European invasion; do you suppose this means I think they were culturally impoverished?

Are you trying to say that those who wrote the Bible could neither read nor write?

The literacy of an elite does not define the literacy level of a culture, unless you believe cultures should be considered only in terms of their elites.

Are you trying to say that they were functional illiterates or aliterate?

You are confusing trees with a forest. A beech forest may contain many other sorts of trees as well, but the general nature of a forest with 50,000 beech trees is not defined by the fact that it also has 2,500 oaks growing in it.

It seems to me that your depiction and characterization of the writers of the Bible constitute yet another ad hominem attack and hence speaks more of you than "them".

Nonsense. I made no reference to the authors of the Bible at all, but only to the culture in which the Old Testament developed. A statement about the literacy level of a culture is not an ad hominem attack on the individual authors of a particular document. If I said that Icelandic culture in the 13th and 14th Centuries was largely illiterate, I am not making a personal attack on the authors of the Icelandic Sagas. Get real.

Oh, and yet another? Please point to the numerous other ad hominem attacks I have launched, which this accusation clearly implies, or else withdraw it.

Ad hominem attacks on one's opponent are a tried-and-true strategy for people who have a case that is weak.

Indeed they are, which is why I eschew them. You have created yet another strawman to assail.

lordkalvan, you've asked: "You think I am a Ph.D geologist?"
My reply: "No."

A reply which advances our discussion not one iota. Of all the points you could have chosen to respond to, this must be one of the least significant. Thanks.

 

[VenomFangX]

MMMM the saga goes on and on. Blinkers on both horses forgetting the people standing on the side.
Oh can you advise how many laps you are going to do so I can place a bet.
yours
ÒõýþüäðýóÖ

 

[Orion]

A part of this thread is getting a bit ridiculous, agreed.

Whenever I see a thread talking about "evidence for an old earth", the only argument against it IS the YEC beliefs that state an earth of ONLY ~6,000 years old. This is basing it off of the geneologies (or so goes the belief). If direct evidence can be found to show an older date than that, then there IS a serious problem for the YEC. If it is ice cores showing more than 100,000 years of time, then that's going to be a problem for YEC. It doesn't show an ULTIMATE age of the earth, but it doesn't have to. It just shows that it is far older than the YEC belief.

 

[kenmaynard]

Can you read German? I can't - and it would be better said of me that I'm illiterate than to suggest such a thing of the ones the Holy Spirit chose as His pen. Still, I ask because maybe you've read Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig, Die Schrift und ihre Verdeutschung (Berlin: Schocken Verlag, 1936). An English translation has been published as Scripture and Translation, edited and translated by Lawrence Rosenwald and Everett Fox (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994).

When you used the word "anarchic" did you mean "of, like, or tending to anarchy" or maybe you meant to use a different word? Perhaps you meant "archaic"? I do take your meaning though. I also note that you have stated, "the argument is about the ability to write with the same linguistic ability and with the same intellectual literacy that as we might do today is not ad hominem at all, it is about the ability to write, clearly and coherently."

lordkalvan is specifically addressing the issue as it applies to our understanding of the cosmos and I object to his characterization of those men of God as illiterate or pre-literate or that they were in any way functional illiterates or aliterate. The only point of that attack was to demean the authors and did nothing to address the statements found in the bible. I'm fairly certain that he will admit to having said, "the bible is not a science book," or something to that effect in the past.


~Sparrow

You spent the first part of the thread complaining that the thread was not sticking very tightly to what you considered the original topic. Now you talk about something completely different. Are you completely incapable of discussing the topic of the young earthers theory that the earth is 6,000-10,000 old?

 

[lordkalvan]

It is fair that you discuss the literacy of the period and try and cross the bridge through time and space till now, but then the thread of the discussion has changed depicting that an ad hominem attack was made on the authors. If it was said that the arguments or scriptures of the ancient authors were incorrect simply because they did not use modern day soap or we did not like their beards, that is ad hominem as it is off the argument.

I am glad that this is obvious to you as well. Not only did I not make an ad hominem attack against the various authors of the Old Testament (whoever they may have been), I did not even mention these authors in the statement I made about the cultural milieu from which the Old Testament emerged.

As the argument is about the ability to write with the same linguistic ability and with the same intellectual literacy that as we might do today is not ad hominem at all, it is about the ability to write, clearly and coherently.

My argument was rather that the Old Testament cannot be expected to address the modern understanding of the natural world because it lacked both the scientific reference points (and vocabulary) and was addressed to a functionally illiterate audience with a variety of purposes, not least helping to maintain a particular elite in its positions of power. For example, I think it was only in the 16th Century that the Italian astronomer Giordano Bruno suggested that stars might be suns, an idea that may have contributed to his trial and burning at the stake for heresy.