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How old is the earth??
tccox
Member Posts: 7,379 ✭✭
A good friend stopped by the other day and in the course of conversation I mentioned something about how old the earth is. He promptly told me it is 10,000 years old. I was floored!! He then told me his religion had figured out how old the world is. WOW!! I had figured it to be much older but I will not argue religion(usually not) with zealots. I do not know his religion but I believe it to be baptist.
My question is: how old is the earth?? How can any religion say it is 10,000 years old or how many years??
have kept mankind in the dark ages and have done more to retard civilization than any other force on earth. Tom
My question is: how old is the earth?? How can any religion say it is 10,000 years old or how many years??
have kept mankind in the dark ages and have done more to retard civilization than any other force on earth. Tom
Comments
The catholic church and others (salem, spanish inquistiion) have done nothing but to keep devotees in the dark (Latin mass) Which is being pushed again( you don't need to dnow what the bible says, just believe me)
Anyway, back to my original question, "How old is the earth?"
[:o)]
Zipperzap, or Doug, werent you guys here when this whole earth being created thing was goin on?[:p][;)]
[:D][:D] You sayin' they're older than the hills and twice as dusty?
XXXXXX
A good friend stopped by the other day and in the course of conversation I mentioned something about how old the earth is. He promptly told me it is 10,000 years old. I was floored!! He then told me his religion had figured out how old the world is. WOW!! I had figured it to be much older but I will not argue religion(usually not) with zealots. I do not know his religion but I believe it to be baptist.
My question is: how old is the earth?? How can any religion say it is 10,000 years old or how many years??
have kept mankind in the dark ages and have done more to retard civilization than any other force on earth. Tom
You're kidding, right? This is one of the biggest cultural battles going on in the USA right now--and one that gets debated on this forum all too frequently.
Roughly half the US public believes that the earth is <12,000 years old (i.e. they're strict creationists). I came up with that number by surveying college freshmen enrolled in Biology classes, but just yesterday heard the same number used in a discussion on National Public Radio.
We have a lot of members here (see ECC's post above) who believe it's <12,000 years old. We also have a lot (see SG's post) who believe it's on the order of 4 billion years old. I fall into the latter camp, FWIW.
This is one of those hot topics that I know I should stay away from, but generally cannot.
Anyway, wake up and smell the roses: chances are, at best half the US public agrees with whatever your notion is of the age of the earth, and the question cannot be answered through a democratic solution.
A1
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He looked me in the eye, cleared his throat, nodded his head and said:
"If I tell you...
...I'd have to kill you, punk."
So, y'know. If the trend continues, I'm cool with that.
Christian fundamentalist groups who subscribe to strict literal interpretation of the bible are often "young earth" theorists. They defend the young earth theory because that is what the bible says, and they take the word of the bible over any and all scientific evidence.
Catholics theorize that science and biblical teachings can exist harmoniously by one helping to explain and interpret the other.
Might we agree that our human clock is not necessarily God's celestial clock and that we are presumptuous to think otherwise? Might it not even be an affront to God to hold ourselves in such high esteem?
And if we can agree that there was a beginning, then is it not fair to postulate that everything we see, hear, and feel became possible at that point? The human problem is in measuring that point and realizing that there might have been a considerable gap between the possible and the actual.
So...Is it not possible that time (as we know it) began about 10,000 years in the past? This is NOT to say that time hasn't existed from the beginning, but rather to say that there was no way to quantify time. Just how might God explain to Adam (when Adam was having trouble grasping the concept of hours, days, and years) the concept and time of creation? And why would God feel constrained to state time in human terms? And even if He tried, how could He?
Past that, is it not accepted by those of us who are faith-based in our beliefs that Adam and Eve were created as immortals before their fall? Is it not true that there was no such thing as time for them until they became mortal? Perhaps we humans confuse what existed before time began as we know it today and when actual time began at the point of creation. Two entirely different things!
We humans are such a strange and conceited bunch. On one hand we mostly acknowledge that the earth (and the entire universe) was created. We then argue whether the creation was at the hands of God, or just a natural phenomena. (I find this interesting as it's unusual to be able to make something out of nothing.)
Next, we humans argue about our relationship (or relation) to the living things surrounding us. God or not, we all came from this earth. We share the common elements of this earth. Do we share 99% of our DNA with the great apes because we're cousins, or do we share it because our Creator used the same basic design for us both? Either way we're related, aren't we?
The first possibility because some common ancestor diverged slightly from the path of others and led to humans as we know them. The second because the hand of a Creator created us slightly differently than other creatures that He was working on. Either way there was a FIRST human. Some defining event set our race apart. Those of faith would argue the hand of God. Those with no faith will argue a random circumstance. Still, the fact remains that there was a FIRST human.
And we humans are so stupid as to fight over such trivial matters? What fools we are!
The thing is, God is eternal and how does one gauge time in eternity. A year would be a blink of the eye or less. Is Genisis truely Gods account of the making of earth or mans interpretation of Gods account? Consider mans limited knowledge at the time.It may have taken God millions of years (a hicup in eternity) but mankind has no conception of that kind of time so what good does it do to use that reference? If God told man it took him a million (mortal) years to create the earth (still a monumental task worthy of great awe) the story of creation would have far less meaning because mankind would not conceive the enormity of such a project over such a time. We often hear "God will provide for us" but that does not necessarily mean he will DIRECTLY care for us. He may "provide" for us by allowing things to happen that help us help ourselves. Can one not apply that same principle to creation? Is God as a Creator not able to use the materials around him to create what he wishes? Remember that eveything that God does needs to be put interms that us mortals can understand with our limited knowledge. Often Jesus used parables for this specific reason. This is also why stories are told from several different perspectives in the bible. I am one of those that believes God and Science do co-exist. Science is Gods means of allowing us to understand greater things, however as with everything else God conveys to us it CAN be misinterpreted by man. WE are all familiar with mankinds ability to interpret what he is told or what he sees. No two interpretations seem to be the same.
1. God wouldn't create evidence that is illogical- i.e. it SEEMS true but isn't (like the earth is really 10,000 years old BUT he created it 4 billion years old with fossils and such just to fool us) as he is not that petty- i.e. radioactive dating and such.
2. The Bible was written by men, inspired by God. Men are fallible. As are translators of later generations.
3. When I was a child I thought as a child; now that I have become a man I have put away childish things. 2000 years ago we couldn't understand 4 billion years and the geologic story of creation; we can now. That's why God gave us the creation story then and scientific knowledge now.
Ben
Not nearly as old as the water on the earth.
Dude! You better think about that one. The water was just in space and then later along came a planet?
quote:Originally posted by MPinkston
Not nearly as old as the water on the earth.
Dude! You better think about that one. The water was just in space and then later along came a planet?
Ahh, the age old question...what came first the water or the planet.
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Keeping Faith isn't easy, especially if you think that you have to continually lie to yourself, or ignore logic to believe.
Ben
Ben: Nothing could be further from the truth. Fortunately there is no reason to lie. [;)]
Keeping Faith isn't easy, especially if you think that you have to continually lie to yourself, or ignore logic to believe.
Ben
Based upon what? Faith isn't easy, especially when one has a closed mind.
Logically-speaking, how do you discount faith or the existence of God?
But i decided to look at it like...
We're not talking earthdays here but days of GOD that might be 100 milion earthyears each or something like that.
anyway there is many scientists that become religious after seeing the structures of how the world is created...
Others go slightly nuts.
I know one that could'nt handle it completely an he's gone shizofrenic
That guy most likely solved the problem with coldfusion mathematicaly
Except for creating the worlds most effective fan based on the archimedes principle.
http://www.bod1000.se/