How could people believe that the Earth was only 6000 years old?

Answer 1

There's plenty of evidence for a young Earth, in addition to religious tradition. You're unaware of this evidence because the schools keep it quiet. The following is just a small sampling of what you could find with a little research.

1) Evolutionists believe it must have taken millions of years for layers of strata to form but they can also be caused by catastrophes (a huge amount of stratum was laid down at the Mt. St. Helen eruption in just five hours).

2) Creationists see the "survival of the fittest" and the dating of rock layers by fossils as being perfect tautologies.

3) "Radiometric techniques may not be the absolute dating methods that they are claimed to be. Age-estimates on a given geological stratum by different radiometric methods are often very different. There is no absolutely reliable long-term radiological clock. The uncertainties inherent in radiometric dating are disturbing to geologists and evolutionists." William D. Stansfield, Ph.D., Instructor of Biology, California Polytechnic State University.

4) "Even total rock systems may be open during metamorphism and may have their isotopic systems changed, making it impossible to determine their geologic age." Prof. Gunter Faure (Department of Geology, The Ohio State University, Columbus.)

5 a). At current rates of erosion the amount of sea-floor sediments actually found do not support a "billions of years" age for the Earth.

b) The amount of Sodium Chloride in the sea, also, is a small fraction of what the "old Earth" theory would postulate.

c) The Earth's magnetic field is decaying too fast to extrapolate a long age for the Earth.

d) The rate of accumulation of Moon-dust has been measured; and the amount of dust on the Moon was found to be vastly less than what scientists had predicted before the Moon-landings.

e) Helium is generated by radioactive elements as they decay. The escape of this helium into the atmosphere can be measured. According to the Evolutionary age of the Earth there should be much more helium in the atmosphere, instead of the 0.05% that is actually there.