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ORIGINAL: robto

Stasis of species is a rather odd argument to use for a young earth. When scientists talk about stasis, it means stasis over a period of millions of years. That's no help for young-earthers.

More fundamentally, though, stasis of species says nothing at all about the age of the earth. The earth could be young, with stable species, or old, with stable species. Maybe I'm missing something big time, but I just don't see how stability of species says anything about the age of the earth.

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ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes
As I also said, I'm not a knowledgeable biologist.

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The history of most fossil species includes two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Stasis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; morphological change is usually limited and directionless. 2. Sudden appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and "fully formed." (Gould, Stephen J., "Evolution's Erratic Pace," Natural History, Vol. 86, No. 5, May 1977, p.14).

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That debate was mostly carried on at a level where I couldn't contribute much.

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And it was boring.

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But paleontologists have made many family trees, showing transitions from species to species, or morphological changes within species.

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They are considered old within an OET model.

If they are non-static, I think both OE and YE supporters agree that evolution cannot produce significant change (say, Pakicetus to Blue Whale) in thousands of years.

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Its principle is that most sexually reproducing populations experience little change for most of their geological history, and that when phenotypic evolution does occur, it is localized in rare, rapid events of branching speciation (called cladogenesis).

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ORIGINAL: Bettawrekonize

The rule of the fossil record is stasis. Non - stasis is the exception, not the rule.

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So then why are you arguing for something that you can't defend?

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ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes
Even if true, the fact that there is any non-stasis at all immediately nullifies your whole point. Game over.

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First you complain that I didn't say anything; now you complain that I spoke up. You're hard to satisfy.

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Anyway, as robto points out, stasis tells us nothing about the age of the earth.

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Mecca watch

A prominent cleric, Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawy, said modern science had at last provided evidence that Mecca was the true centre of the Earth; proof, he said, of the greatness of the Muslim "qibla" - the Arabic word for the direction Muslims turn to when they pray.

The meeting also reviewed what has been described as a Mecca watch, the brainchild of a French Muslim. The watch is said to rotate anti-clockwise and is supposed to help Muslims determine the direction of Mecca from any point on Earth. The meeting in Qatar is part of a popular trend in some Muslim societies of seeking to find Koranic precedents for modern science. It is called "Ijaz al-Koran", which roughly translates as the "miraculous nature of the holy text".

The underlying belief is that scientific truths were also revealed in the Muslim holy book, and it is the work of scholars to unearth and publicise the textual evidence.

But the movement is not without its critics, who say that the notion that modern science was revealed in the Koran confuses spiritual truth, which is constant, and empirical truth, which depends on the state of science at any given point in time.

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ORIGINAL: BVZ

So... do you guys have any actual evidence for a young earth, or what?

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: BVZ

So... do you guys have any actual evidence for a young earth, or what?

Welcome back, BVZ!

Most of the stuff from post #2 weren't addressed. I hesitate to even bring it up because it's disastrous to a thread for more than one thing to be discussed at the same time. I would not, however, that a great weakness to the concept of a young solar system is the fact that the answer to the question "Why do we still have comets?" is answered by the Oort Cloud hypothesis. Where is the evidence for the Oort Cloud? Well, it's the fact that we still have comets! The fact that the hypothetical cloud was placed nearly a light year away from the center of the solar system has placed it safely out of the range of any possibility for observational evidence within our lifetime. That being the case, I would say that comets are still a very real evidence that our solar system is young.

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ORIGINAL: cow451

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: BVZ

So... do you guys have any actual evidence for a young earth, or what?

Welcome back, BVZ!

Most of the stuff from post #2 weren't addressed. I hesitate to even bring it up because it's disastrous to a thread for more than one thing to be discussed at the same time. I would not, however, that a great weakness to the concept of a young solar system is the fact that the answer to the question "Why do we still have comets?" is answered by the Oort Cloud hypothesis. Where is the evidence for the Oort Cloud? Well, it's the fact that we still have comets! The fact that the hypothetical cloud was placed nearly a light year away from the center of the solar system has placed it safely out of the range of any possibility for observational evidence within our lifetime. That being the case, I would say that comets are still a very real evidence that our solar system is young.

The poster gave no links to support any of these contentions, most of which are clearly false or faulty logic as one poster noted in #3.

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

Where is the evidence for the Oort Cloud? Well, it's the fact that we still have comets! The fact that the hypothetical cloud was placed nearly a light year away from the center of the solar system has placed it safely out of the range of any possibility for observational evidence within our lifetime. That being the case, I would say that comets are still a very real evidence that our solar system is young.

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ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

Where is the evidence for the Oort Cloud? Well, it's the fact that we still have comets! The fact that the hypothetical cloud was placed nearly a light year away from the center of the solar system has placed it safely out of the range of any possibility for observational evidence within our lifetime. That being the case, I would say that comets are still a very real evidence that our solar system is young.

Although the Oort Cloud is too far away to make very good observations, the Kuiper Belt is quite a bit closer. How many Kuiper Belt objects (KBO) are there? The first one was spotted only in 1992. There are now more than a thousand known. Scattered Disc Objects are thought to be KBOs that have been chucked a bit further out, and make good candidates for future comets. A number of them have been discovered. And there are a couple objects that have aphelia so far from the sun that they may be associated with the Oort Cloud.

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ORIGINAL: PromiseLander

As I am no scientist, I took these from some random website...

#1) The Sun is shrinking at the rate of 5 ft/hr. The Earth is 93 million miles away from the Sun. In less than 20 million years, the Sun would have been so large that it would touch the surface of the Earth. Further, if the Sun had more mass, the gravity pull would be much larger and the Earth would have been sucked into the Sun long before 20 million years.

#2) Short-period comets, like the Haley Comet in our solar system, whose life expectancy is only 10,000 years old, would have been blown apart by the solar winds years ago if they were older.

#3) Absence of fossilized meteorites in different layers of strata on Earth proves that Evolution is a farse. According to evolution, different layers of strata were exposed for billions and billions of years, but only the top layers of the Earth have fossilized meteorites, and that in abundance.

#4) The Moon is receding from the Earth every year. If the Earth were billions of years old, then the Moon would have been too close to the Earth. According to the inverse square law, the tides would have been so strong that everything would have died twice a day!

#5) Jupiter, Saturn, and its little moon "I-O" are cooling off very rapidly, but they are still very hot. If billions of years had passed, they should have been cold already.

#6) The Earth's magnetic field is decreasing half a life every 830 years. This magnetic field can't be more than 10,000 years; there is no way to reverse it.

#7) Look at the amount of lava and volcanoes on Earth. The Volume of lava ÷ Rate of lava coming out of the volcanoes = Amount of years. If the Earth was billions of years old, there would be much more lava on the surface of the planet.

#8) Look at the amount of minerals in the sea. The amount of minerals in the sea ÷ Influx of minerals into the sea = Amount of years. This shows only a few thousand years.

#9) Look at the formation rate of Helium in the Atmosphere. This shows the Earth could be at the most 0.2 million years -- God created the Earth with some Helium already.

#10) The Erosion Rate of the continents is so large that the Earth would have eroded to sea level in 14 million years.

#11) The top soil formation on Earth is formed at a steady rate which shows only a few thousand years.

#12) Oil Pressure would have leaked out if the earth were billions of years old. Scientists can get garbage and turn into oil in a lab in 20 minutes.

#13) The size of the Mississippi river delta ÷ The amount of mud being deposited = The time the delta has been in existence. This shows less than 30,000 years old. Noah's flood deposited 80% of the delta in a few days.

#14) The Earth slows down as it spins at a rate of a thousandth of a second. In a million years, the earth would have been spinning too fast for life on earth.

#15) The largest stalactites and stone formation in caves around the earth only show a few thousand years, like in the Sequoia Cave in Tennessee. Stalactites grow rapidly, at a rate of 1 inch every year; the largest stalactite shows to be about 4,400 years old. In Florida, there are stalactites of 16 inches growing from an electrical wire.

#16) The Sahara desert is expanding. Once the soil is depleted, it is irreversible. The expansion rate is 4 miles per year at the present moment. At a rate of ¼ mile per year, the age of the Earth would come to about 4,400 years old.

#17) The seas are getting saltier every year. If the Earth was billions of years old, the oceans would be too salty for any form of life by now.

#18) The current world population is 5½ billion. If we started with 8 people 4,000 years ago, this would give us a population of 5 or 6 billion.

#19) The oldest coral reef is 4,200 years old in Australia. Remember that Noah's Flood was about 4,400 years ago.

#20) The oldest known historical date is 6,000 years ago. The oldest written form is very complex; humans were not stupid.

#21) The oldest living tree is 4,300 years old.

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ORIGINAL: DanJames
It's possible that most of them were. The post had the smell of Creation Science Evangelism, methinks. I wouldn't take them seriously without a link to where they came from so I could check their sources. At least the comets one is a valid argument for a young solar system though, right?

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: robto

Stasis of species is a rather odd argument to use for a young earth. When scientists talk about stasis, it means stasis over a period of millions of years. That's no help for young-earthers.

More fundamentally, though, stasis of species says nothing at all about the age of the earth. The earth could be young, with stable species, or old, with stable species. Maybe I'm missing something big time, but I just don't see how stability of species says anything about the age of the earth.

I don't know whether Jhud goes this far, but at least my argument is actually about the apparent stasis of species. The fact that it looks like things stayed the same for hundreds of millions of years is evidence that the fossil record is not evidence of gradualism, but of a flood that buried the stuff that we basically have today.

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At least the comets one is a valid argument for a young solar system though, right?

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ORIGINAL: robto

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: robto

Stasis of species is a rather odd argument to use for a young earth. When scientists talk about stasis, it means stasis over a period of millions of years. That's no help for young-earthers.

More fundamentally, though, stasis of species says nothing at all about the age of the earth. The earth could be young, with stable species, or old, with stable species. Maybe I'm missing something big time, but I just don't see how stability of species says anything about the age of the earth.

I don't know whether Jhud goes this far, but at least my argument is actually about the apparent stasis of species. The fact that it looks like things stayed the same for hundreds of millions of years is evidence that the fossil record is not evidence of gradualism, but of a flood that buried the stuff that we basically have today.

The problem with this is that it DOESN'T look like things stayed the same for hundreds of millions of years. The earth at the time of the dinosaurs was a very different place - different plants, different animals, and NO evidence of ANY of the species we see today. For instance, there were NO flowering trees before about 100 million years ago.

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At least the comets one is a valid argument for a young solar system though, right?

It would only be a valid argument for a young solar system if there was proof that the Oort cloud doesn't exist. As it is, it is neutral: The Oort cloud MIGHT exist, and be the source of long-period comets. Or, it might not, in which case the young-SS hypothesis is strengthened. Until an Oort cloud is proven or disproven, the comet argument doesn't add anything to either side.

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ORIGINAL: drj11

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ORIGINAL: DanJames
It's possible that most of them were. The post had the smell of Creation Science Evangelism, methinks. I wouldn't take them seriously without a link to where they came from so I could check their sources. At least the comets one is a valid argument for a young solar system though, right?

I posted a rebuttal somewhere on the second page of the thread... since there were really so many points, the only real way to respond is with a link. It's up to you if you trust the source or not. The page addresses every one of them, and several others. I guess that creationist factoid list is used pretty commonly.

Here it is again.
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/dave_matson/young-earth/specific_arguments/

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

I have to prove that the Oort cloud DOESN'T exist. Something that has no evidence of existing (I know ES I'm just saying this to prove a point. I don't denounce your evidence because I can't) has to be proven to NOT exist. Tucked away, safely out of range of observability. They could have said that comets come from the spit of the invisible pink unicorn!

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ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

I have to prove that the Oort cloud DOESN'T exist. Something that has no evidence of existing (I know ES I'm just saying this to prove a point. I don't denounce your evidence because I can't) has to be proven to NOT exist. Tucked away, safely out of range of observability. They could have said that comets come from the spit of the invisible pink unicorn!

The KBO and Scattered Belt objects are in the right place to form periodic comets, i.e. those with periods under 200 years. So the argument is only about long-period comets. And long-period comets don't visit the sun very often, and thus may not burn up in a strict YEC timeline, since some long-period comets have periods in the thousands, or even millions, of years.

I can't help it if the math says that most long-period comets have to come from far away. However, the fact that we have a verified and existing source (which was once only a hypothesis itself) for short period comets (quite similar in nature to the Oort cloud) certainly make the Oort cloud a lot more feasible than unicorn spit.

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ORIGINAL: essentialsaltes

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

I have to prove that the Oort cloud DOESN'T exist. Something that has no evidence of existing (I know ES I'm just saying this to prove a point. I don't denounce your evidence because I can't) has to be proven to NOT exist. Tucked away, safely out of range of observability. They could have said that comets come from the spit of the invisible pink unicorn!

The KBO and Scattered Belt objects are in the right place to form periodic comets, i.e. those with periods under 200 years. So the argument is only about long-period comets. And long-period comets don't visit the sun very often, and thus may not burn up in a strict YEC timeline, since some long-period comets have periods in the thousands, or even millions, of years.

I can't help it if the math says that most long-period comets have to come from far away. However, the fact that we have a verified and existing source (which was once only a hypothesis itself) for short period comets (quite similar in nature to the Oort cloud) certainly make the Oort cloud a lot more feasible than unicorn spit.

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ORIGINAL: cow451

Were unicorns on the ark?

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: cow451

Were unicorns on the ark?

Grow up. J/K

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ORIGINAL: cow451

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ORIGINAL: DanJames

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ORIGINAL: cow451

Were unicorns on the ark?

Grow up. J/K

You first.