Is there any definition of ‘science’ that does refer to a community of experts?
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There it is. Glad we’re on the same page now.
Of course, all that does is kick the can down the road, because now you have to define “scientist.”
I entirely agree—assuming that the person is sincerely willing to apply that general education and modern world skills to the body of evidence. For me, coming from a YEC background, it took a lot of careful consideration of that evidence and the eventual realization that the best way to summarize that huge body of evidence is in the word consilience. All the pieces of the puzzle (the evidence from many fields of scientific inquiry) fit so well together!
Indeed, so many of the YEC arguments I knew so well were simply shotgun attempts at discrediting a particular category of evidence, sometimes with mutually contradictory lines of reasoning. And seeing that woeful inability to explain the broader consilience of evidence actually convinced me just how feeble and desperate were the Young Earth Creationist arguments I had once used. (Of course, the fact that my own experiences within the YEC movement troubled me with so many instances of either blatant ignorance or blatant dishonesty—I hesitate and grieve to casually conclude the latter—made my investigation all the more urgent.)
My final conclusions were also in part theological: I refuse to believe that a creator of the universe (whether one assumes the deity described in the Bible or some other deity) would somehow scheme to fill the world with such copious evidence for a very old universe (and a very old earth) when he actually created it just a few thousand years ago. That seems quite illogical to me.
My point is that after considerable investigation, even though YECism and Flat-Earth-ism are not comparable in every category of consideration, they both share the problem of overwhelming consilience of evidence against them. And one need not possess advanced training in every relevant scientific field to recognize the quality and quantity of that consilience of evidence against them.
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Note that there is no mention in that definition (which was never intended as a rigorous description) of a community of experts. We’re not even in the same library and will never be until you manage to open your eyes sufficiently to examine the evidence. None are so blind…
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Ok, back from a fantastic ski trip.
Funny you should mention that. I was just thinking about how tired I’ve gotten with my profile pic. Having a Mohawk at that time was more out of humor. That “dude-with-an-attitude” pic I took was more of a joke, something to annoy my kids with. I happened to have that image it when I joined PS.
But, it doesn’t match my personality (and that Mohawk is long gone). However after joining,
@swamidass gave me that title. Now I’m stuck with it. So I went back and found a Mohawked pic that I prefer better.
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Pics? 
I’m willing to try. Your original post was certainly genuine, and not hostile; and I hated to see a lack of decent replies.
There’s so much to discuss on this topic. It’s tough to know where to start.
These are just some categories of topics:
- My own journey to accepting YEC (although perhaps not the most interesting).
- Evidence for YEC. Evidence against Deep Time.
- My own top list of evidences against YEC. I don’t mind sharing my thoughts on those.
- Theological discussion on an important question every bible believer needs to consider when it comes to the age of the earth.
- A brief outline of logical steps (including a small number of ‘givens’) which have made me settle on a belief YEC.
I do have a few posts I’ll start with. After that, perhaps let you decide what to dialog about.
But first,
I do want to share my hesitations: I still have that voice saying “Why bother?”. I’m quite comfortable with my conclusion. I enjoy sharing my thoughts with others. I don’t mind criticism, and even welcome having my views critiqued.
However here in PS, the thought of starting a dialog with any of the topics above sounds a little exhausting. Primarily due to being so outnumbered (especially by so many smarter than me). I could elaborate, but I’m sure you know what I mean.
I recall hearing about the creation of threads within PS geared towards limiting the amount of posts, perhaps through user white-listing, or extra mediator monitoring. I have considered requesting that. But at the same time, I don’t really want to limit who can post. I do value feedback.
I’m ok with just leaving as-is: letting anyone post, but everyone will just have to understand that there’s no way I can even read everyone’s post, let alone reply to all of them. I will primarily engage with only you Allen. Got any thoughts on that? (or mediators?).
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Indeed. I certainly do my best to listen to all arguments against it (time permitting).
Already started reading it. Tnx.
I think it would be best to directly address the main topic: Is it unfair to compare YECism with flat-earthism? And why? If you want to address all these other questions, perhaps you could start your own thread about “Why I am a Young Earth Creationist” or something similar.
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I for one would be interested in such a new thread. But a new thread would indeed be necessary.
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Sounds great, Jeff. And I also think it would be advisable to go about this with several of the items on your “categories” list addressed as their own threads (one at a time, obviously, because topics like the “theological discussion” of #4 could probably generate many weighty tomes.) There’s no reason we can’t go about this at a very leisurely pace. One “peaceful” thread at a time could be pleasant and sustainable.
It may be difficult to get far in this “Is it unfair compare YECism with flat-earthism” sub-thread without first pursuing #2 and #3 (and perhaps #5) on their own threads. After examining the scientific evidence of various sorts in those thread discussions, we could resume the OP of this thread (or, at least, your sub-thread of it.)
Even though starting with #2 could get right to the heart of these matters, I’m very much interested in reading of your journey in #1. It could also be its own thread—but I would suggest to everyone that posters on that thread should focus on understanding your thoughts and experiences and leave the critiques of the scientific evidence to later threads focusing on #2 and #3. Especially because I have my own considerable background in the YEC community—including long ago knowing John Whitcomb Jr. of The Genesis Flood fame and also Henry Morris and Duane Gish to much lesser degrees—I’m always interested in how others have processed their “creation science” experiences.
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At one time, for my own purpose I started a diagram of connections to lay out how evidence such as carbon dating tied in with ice cores, lake varves, ocean bed varves, tree rings, stable isotopes, and on and on. Then drew in the same for magnetic reversals, Thorium dating, and so forth. I had to give up before I hardly began, because the diagram soon had so many connecting lines that it just turned into one big crisscrossing hairball hopeless to follow. There is vast consilience of data which is independently produced, but validates several other proxies.
One of the blatant misrepresentations of YEC is that such consilience is the result of circular assumptions, and that one chronological technique is used to calibrate the other, so that they then of course agree. This is desperate line of attack. Dendrochronology and varves stands on their own and the principles involved are routine aspects of life seasonality witnessed in the calendar of everyday life. Radiometric dating rests on assumptions not as common, but the basic explanations are accessible, and the techniques are also independent and undeniable, with the YEC dismissals defying physics and requiring arbitrary and preposterous miracles to avoid irradiating and vaporizing the planet.
Given the overwhelming large picture presented by the consilience of various evidences, YEC presentations prefer to divide and conquer, narrowly focused on inventing and exaggerating problems for one dating technique at a time. It is rare that creationists make any allusion to how these many independent data sets can all be wildly wrong, and yet yield results so well matched one with all the others. While for scientific reconstructions of the past, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, for YEC the whole of the absurdity is greater than sum of the adsurdities.
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I suspect may of the items that would fall under #2, and maybe #3 too, have already been discussed here at some point. So discussions of them may be short and consist largely of links.
Something I would be curious to see is are there independent methods that can corroborate a specific age of the Earth independent of the Ussher chronology under YEC?
Whenever I’ve read or discussed YEC literature in the past, it usually seems to centre on arguing against deep time and then just assuming the Ussher chronology or some variant thereof as a means of determining the age of the Earth.
If the age of the Earth (and universe) really was much younger than conventional geology and physics indicates, then there should be a way to independently measure that age irrespective of any specific religious view or text.
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If nothing else, there should be some means of dating the flood based on physical evidence.
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Ha! Good question.
Two days of terrain park and moguls…and I didn’t take a single picture. 
Sorry.
Certainly. And Allen, I see you Liked.
Perhaps I got a little ambitious considering all the multiple pieces that go into these kind of decisions; and was also looking at showing why I believe it’s the best world-view model. You just wanted more reasonable than FE. That “lowers the bar”, thankfully.
Agreed! And I’m assuming you mean sub-threads off of this post (versus new topics on the forum root).
Given the “lowered bar” mentioned previously I decided to go with #5 above: A series of logical steps. That will touch on all topics (including #2-4), yet shorten things up and help move things along. Personally, I don’t want to get too bogged down on each category, but save those ‘deep-dives’ for another day.
Instead of posting the series of logical steps to start with, I’m going to start some threads that lead up to it, then post the full series at the end (and hopefully not get derailed along the way). No doubt many rebuttals from others will come. But in the interest of time, I’ll just press on with each. Though I will respond to questions you have Allen.
And I assume that you’d agree that we’re ok to respectfully disagree when we need to. It sounds like you’re pretty comfortable with your beliefs, and aren’t looking for any conversion either way, just asking “Are you at least making rational decisions?” This understanding also helps move the discussion along.
Question first (still a PS novice here): How do I create a sub-thread?
Ok, that’s pretty cool. I would have like to have met them, although I got to hear Duane Gish speak once.
Sure, will try to remember to circle back around to that one.
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Jeff, you just conflated mere arguments with evidence. Why?
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Seeing how arguments can be based upon evidence, I don’t consider their “conflation” in this casual and affable agreement to “listen to all arguments” some sort of logic error or error of definition. Moreover, there are good arguments and there are bad arguments, so I would say that the qualifier “mere” must be used cautiously and be applied on a case by case basis. (Obviously, in scientific discussions, those arguments which are well rooted in evidence, tend to be much better arguments.)
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