Creation

Creationism is based on an unprovable and untestable belief in the origin of the universe. Since it has no evidence in a scientific sense whatsoever, creationists are left with only rhetorical tools (e.g. science-bashing).

Sensible creationists understand that faith and science are not necessarily mutually exclusive but also that faith and science are working on different aspects of human existence. Unfortunately, these creationists are the minority of creationists.

As for presenting their own evidence - they regularly do. It just doesn't get the publicity since it is not a mainstream opinion.

Interestingly, while belief in evolution, or "transmutation" as it was called, was widespread back in Darwin's grandfather's day amongst natural philosophers; Natural Selection itself was not accepted until the discovery of the mechanism and the formulation of the laws of inheritance... after Darwin's death.

The impossibility of explaining the structure of genomes without evolution is given as the most recent compelling evidence for its existence. Such scientists having no real interest in the subject until now.

A recent example of this is the recent publishing of a book by John Hartnett of the University of Western Australia on astronomy and the 'big bang', providing an explanation of the issue of 'astronomical time' and the age of the universe from a creationist perspective.

Dr. Damadian holds the patent as the inventor of the MRI scan, a great breakthrough in medical technology and diagnosis.

Dr John Baumgartner is a world leader in the field of plate techtonics and 'rapid subduction' modeling.

Need for Clarity

Creationists also regularly point our the misuse of common terminology when driven by an agenda which seeks to prove or assumes evolution, contrary to the facts of science. This is a purely natural thing to do and is regularly done in mainstream science.

Genetics is one field where creationists point out how science demonstrates the impossibility of evolution. Mendel began the science of modern genetics and showed how characteristics, although they remained hidden for some generations were always there in the 'gene pool' but remained unexpressed. More recent work has demonstrated that no new genetic information can arise spontaneously to make the many changes required to take place.

Genetics also demonstrates that there is a definite limit to change and also the fact that mutations and recombination do not create new traits although they may damage or alter the way existing characteristics are expressed to confer a selection advantage. Such is the case with blind cave fish who have 'lost' the ability to express the genes for eyes which they do not need.

Creationists in particular point out the misuse of terminology such as natural selection to 'prove' evolution when all it shows is that organisms change in response to their environment in accord with previously existing genetic information within the 'gene pool' of that organism. The classic example of the peppered moths (although of course now shown to be a fraudulent experiment) still were and remain peppered moths.

Summary:

Creationists do both criticism, where warranted, and presentation of new evidence as this is discovered. They also seek to be scientifically rigorous in the use of terminology.

Further summary:

Cladistitians who study the changes in genes would of course disagree with the above "clarification" and will cite gene duplication as further evidence of common ancestry of of all creatures.

The "only changing in response" argument against Natural Selection (using capital letters to avoid semantic obfuscation) was refuted upon the rediscovery of Mendel's work and also the discovery of the role of the nucleus and reproductive cells in the organism late in the nineteenth century.

A tendency to the conservation of energy explains the natural selection of blind cave fish in such an environment and it is understood that the permanent expression of such is reflected in the genes over a much longer period of time. As in the case of mitochondrial genes.

As usual the debate centres over the age of the Earth in the final analysis. Time is the critical factor here. Incidental, abstracted scientists tend to be the apologists for creationism in the mainstream. Such as Lord Kelvin in refuting the "soft sciences" of biology and geology when he had no idea of how the sun even functioned in producing heat.

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Creationists teach that the world was created roughly 6000 years ago [4004BC (Bishop Ussher's date of creation) + 2008 yrs 6012 years ago] as of this date in 2008.

ANSWER

The simplistic answer to this question is that the earth was created in 4004BC and since it's 2015 now it is 6018 years old [note: no year zero between 1BC and 1AD] meaning that the earth and everything on it and the whole entire universe is roughly 6000 years old.

However, it's more complicated than that!

The relevant verses quoted are:-

Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.-

Genesis 1 :2 Now the earth was without shape and empty.......

However, these verses are actually English translations of the Hebrew words

There was more than one creation: there were actually two.:-

The FIRST was when God created the entire universe (including earth) for Lucifer and the angels some time in the past.

[ Lucifer was put in charge of all this. The universe was created to be run by and suitable for angels. However, Lucifer rebelled, his name was changed to Satan and the angels who followed him became demons, and the entire universe (including earth) was wrecked and rendered barren in judgement.]

The SECOND was when God then started all over again and re-created the earth so it was suitable for Man and to be ruled by Man {Adam}.

[ Satan didn't want to give up his realm so made Adam surrender it by causing him to sin, and then Jesus Christ - the second Adam - took it back again, but that's a different story!].

In summary

The earth was re-created 6000 years ago, but it was originally created long before then.

That is why there are two different times for the ages of the earth and the universe: scientists have calculated that while the universe is 13.8 Billion years old the Earth is only 4.6 Billion.

All Creation Scientists, whether YEC or OEC accept these dates to one degree or the other.

For explanatory details and verification of the above, see:-

(1) The first relevant verse and translation notes in NET Bible:-:-

Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

The English word "created" is a translation of the Hebrew word 'bara' and really means the universe and earth was not created out of nothing in 4004BC but rather was re-created in 4004BC.

For verification see NET Bible reference notes on Genesis 1:1:-

The English verb "create" captures well the meaning of the Hebrew term in this context. The verb (bara') always describes the divine activity of fashioning something new, fresh, and perfect. The verb does not necessarily describe creation out of nothing... it often stresses forming anew, reforming, renewing

(2) The second relevant verse and translation notes in NET Bible:-:-

Genesis 1 :2 Now the earth was without shape and empty.......

For verification see NET Bible reference notes on Genesis 1:2:-

Some translate 1:2a "and the earth became," arguing that v. 1 describes the original creation of the earth, while v. 2 refers to a judgment that reduced it to a chaotic condition. Verses 3ff. then describe the re-creation of the earth. ...... The words describe a condition that is without form and empty. What we now know as "the earth" was actually an unfilled mass covered by water and darkness.

(3) Also See the very detailed and unbiased article "Is There a Gap Between Genesis One Verse 1 and 2?" by : Arnold Mendez ]

The following are some of the scientific arguments used by young earth creationists. Sometimes the arguments do not explicitly point to the Biblical age used by creationists of 6000-10,000.

1. Rapid Disintegration of Comets: means they cannot be 5 billion years old or they wouldn't exist. Around 100,000 years is postulated as a maximum.

2. Insufficient sea-floor sediment: At current rates of erosion the amount of sea-floor sediments actually found could accumulate in 12 million years. The oceans are alleged to have existed for 3 billion years.

3. Insufficent Sodium Chloride in the sea: Evolutionary estimates for the age of the earth's oceans are 3 billion years. With current rates of deposition, the salt in the sea could have accumulated in 42-62 million years at todays rate and of course much faster in the Noahic flood.

4. Decay of the magnetic field of the Earth: This is occurring too rapidly to fit the long-age evolutionary paradigm - the total energy stored having decreased by a factor of 2.7 over the past 1000 years. Creationists have a model explaining this based on sound physics.

5. Tightly bent strata: These stata, thousands of feet thick are tightly bent without cracking. Yet they are meant to have solidified over millions of years and then bent. The creationist explanation is that they formed while still plastic as the entire formation had to be soft when formed to avoid cracking. This would point to the folding having occurred thousands of years and not millions after formation.

6. Fossil Radioactivity: Radiohaloes which have shown evidence of having been squashed indicate that the Jurassic, Triassic and Eocene formations in the Colorado plateau were formed in a short time-frame - over months, not hundreds of millions of years. This is so since the rings formed by the haloes, which only exist for a short time before they decay were squashed, indicating rapid formation. If the rocks had formed over a long time span the haloes would not have been there.

7. Misplaced Helium: Helium is generated by radioactive elements as they decay. The escape of this Helium into the atmosphere can be measured. If this has been occurring for 5 billion years there should be much more Helium in the atmosphere, instead of the 0.05% that is actually there when compared to the relevant time scale.

8. Insufficient stone-age skeletons: The 100,000 year stone-age of evolutionary anthropologists should have produced many more skeletons - around 4 billion, many more of which should still be around compared to the few thousand found.

9. Recent Agriculture: The archeological evidence shows the stone age people to be as intelligent as modern man and yet it is claimed they existed for 100,000 years before discovering that plants grow from seeds. Creationists would think that it is more likely that man was without agriculture for a much shorter period immediately after the flood.

10.History too short: Stone-age people built huge monuments, did beautiful cave paintings and kept records of lunar phases. It seems unreasonable that they should wait nearly 100,000 years before beginning to make written historical records around 4-5000 BC. A much shorter Biblical time-scale seems to better fit this evidence.

Source: These points are condensed from an article by creationist Dr. Russel Humphreys, in Creation Ex Nihilo 13(3):28-31, June -August 1991.

The footnotes to this article contain the relevant scientific data relating to the points made. This will be posted as a link for those wishing to check the data or inquire further.

There is scant scientific evidence to supports the position of creationism, most of which is either misinterpreted or contradicted by more consistent data. Creationist claims and evidence tend to be misunderstood or misinterpreted facts, which when coupled with misapplied laws of science create a distorted worldview.

For example, above is a large list of "proofs", none of which make sense when properly explained and considered in the context of other scientific fields. In addition to these are others which are as easily rebuffed, leaving little to support creationism of any form, much less to cast significant doubt on evolution. For a rebuttal of each of the points above please refer to the discussion page.

Many religions teach that the world was created by a supreme god, usually only a few thousand years ago. Because the ancient leaders of these religions had no understanding of evolution and change, they taught that the world always was as it is today. They held that people have existed, in their present form, since the time of creation, and that at the very beginning they began to build great civilisations. Some traditions even held that the earth existed before the sun, moon and stars.

Evolution challenges all this, because it shows that the world was formed by natural processes over millions of years, and that species evolved by natural selection. It even shows that humans evolved over a period of several million years from a more ape-like species. The challenge for religions is to adapt their beliefs in the light of scientific knowledge or to become increasingly irrelevant.

For more informationon evolution and how religion responds to it, please visit: http://christianity.answers.com/theology/the-story-of-creation

Richard Dawkins is the Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science, at Oxford University. In this position, he clearly has a sound understanding of scientific issues such as evolution and the creation of the universe. This has led him to believe that Creationism is inherently untrue. Since his role is to advance the public understaning of Science, he has written books such as The God Delusion(Bantam Press, 2006) to explain his views.

I think that Professor Dawkins sees Creationism as dependently linked to religious belief. Where he views Creationism to contend with Science, which he asserts is quite often, Dawkins prefers to focus on the inherent failure of the underlying religious belief rather than simply demonstrating the error of the Creationist belief and leaving the proponent to continue in his or her religious beliefs.

The debate around creationism and evolution is more fully covered in: http://christianity.answers.com/theology/the-story-of-creation

Young Earth Creationist View There is a great deal of scientific evidence which suggests that the earth is nowhere near the ages claimed. Most of this evidence comes through the work of researchers who do not believe in the Bible account of creation. The evidence would allow the Bible chronology with a relatively recent creation around 6000 years ago to be correct.

1. Insufficient sea-floor sediment: At current rates of erosion the amount of sea-floor sediments actually found could accumulate in 12 million years. The oceans are alleged to have existed for 3 billion years.

Creationists contend these sediments could have accumulated rapidly at the flood of Noah c. 5000 years ago.

2. Insufficent Sodium Chloride in the sea: Evolutionary estimates for the age of the earth's oceans are 3 billion years. With current rates of deposition, the salt in the sea could have accumulated in 42-62 million years at todays rate and of course much faster in the Noahic flood.

Note: Calculations done for many other elements produce even younger ages.

3. Decay of the magnetic field of the Earth: This is occurring too rapidly to fit the long-age evolutionary paradigm - the total energy stored having decreased by a factor of 2.7 over the past 1000 years. Creationists have a model explaining this based on sound physics.

4. Tightly bent strata: These stata, thousands of feet thick are tightly bent without cracking. Yet they are meant to have solidified over millions of years and then bent. The creationist explanation is that they formed while still plastic as the entire formation had to be soft when formed to avoid cracking. This would point to the folding having occurred thousands of years and not millions after formation.

5. Fossil Radioactivity: Radiohaloes which have shown evidence of having been squashed indicate that the Jurassic, Triassic and Eocene formations in the Colorado plateau were formed in a short time-frame - over months, not hundreds of millions of years. This is so since the rings formed by the haloes, which only exist for a short time before they decay were squashed, indicating rapid formation. If the rocks had formed over a long time span the haloes would not have been there.

6. Misplaced Helium: Helium is generated by radioactive elements as they decay. The escape of this Helium into the atmosphere can be measured. If this has been occurring for 5 billion years there should be much more Helium in the atmosphere, instead of the 0.05% that is actually there when compared to the relevant time scale.

7. Insufficient stone-age skeletons: The 100,000 year stone-age of evolutionary anthropologists should have produced many more skeletons - around 4 billion, many more of which should still be around compared to the few thousand found.

8. Recent Agriculture: The archeological evidence shows the stone age people to be as intelligent as modern man and yet it is claimed they existed for 100,000 years before discovering that plants grow from seeds. Creationists would think that it is more likely that man was without agriculture for a much shorter period immediately after the flood.

9. History too short: Stone-age people built huge monuments, did beautiful cave paintings and kept records of lunar phases. It seems unreasonable that they should wait nearly 100,000 years before beginning to make written historical records around 4-5000 BC. A much shorter Biblical time-scale seems to better fit this evidence.

Source: These points are condensed from an article by creationist Dr. Russel Humphreys, in Creation Ex Nihilo13(3):28-31, June -August 1991.

These are not the only arguments used by creationists, but are a sample of some.

Other arguments include:

Processes thought to take a long period of time can take a short time given the right conditions: Among the list of such processes includes the following:

Coal and Oil formation. Opal formation. Stalactites and Stalagmites in Limestone and other caves.

Diamonds

General Geologic processes are not always slow and gradual but sometimes catastrophic in nature

Some Examples of Rapid Geologic Processes. The long accepted dogma taught by Charles Lyell that geologic processes always take vast amounts of time is being challenged by recent discoveries in science.

The following are now accepted as having formed catastrophically in a relatively short period of time:

- a major portion of Washington State

- the Snake River Plain of Idaho

- the Altai region of Southern Siberia

- the Black Sea basin

- the upper Mississippi River Valley

- the Hudson River Valley including New York City

- Wyoming's Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone

- Owen's River Gorge in California

- the Great Lakes/S. Lawrence River drainage basin

- the English Channel and Dover Straits (the most recently discovered addition to this list)

Scientists who are not creationists of any kind are now openly talking about catastrophism of a major kind in shaping some of these vast areas. Diamonds, Coal and Opals These have all been demonstrated as not requiring millions of years to form. They can all be formed quite quickly under the right conditions and in some situations are indistinguishable from the 'real thing'. Answer Old Earth creationists Old Earth creationists generally accept the scientific evidence for the age of the Earth as being about 4.54 billion years. They believe that God created the earth, but allowed or directed its gradual evolution.

Prior to reading the answers below, it is perhaps important to note that there is no 'creation theory'. There are various religious creation myths, but no comprehensive and robust scientific model that has any explanatory or predictive power.

Answer: Quite a few scientists support creation theory. This places them out of step with the mainstream scientists who believe in autobiogenesis, or a spontaneous origin of life, coupled with evolution. As Richard Dawkins put it "It is a monumental disagreement. One side or the other has got to be wrong, and not just slightly wrong but catastrophically, ignominiously, disastrously wrong."

Prior to the 20th Century, most scientists believed in Creation.

Today, there are numerous organizations of scientists who support creation theory: Answers in Genesis ; Creation Research, Science Education Foundation; Institute for Creation Research; The Creation SuperLibrary and others. Some publish peer-reviewed journals, such as the Creation Research Society's CRS Journal and the Journal of Creation by Creation Ministries International (The Australian arm of Answers in Genesis).

Answer While it is true that many "scientists" disagree with evolution in favor of creationism, that number drops significantly when you consider only those who study nature or life, and is almost non-existent when you consider only those with expertise in fields like biology, paleontology, geology or astronomy - the above list may seem impressive, but it is out of well over a hundred thousand PhD scientists alive today. Now it's also important to note that many scientists believe in some sort of god or creator, but are not creationists. Creationism generally refers to strict 6-day creation fundamentalism or the movement to teach that there is a god in science classes in public schools. About 60% of scientists believe in a personal god, many believe this god created life indirectly, which can be considered a different sort of creationism. Meanwhile about 99.85% of earth and life scientists (those same scientists who mostly believe in a personal god) accept evolution as well.

Answer Yes, quite a few actually. Many scientists and researchers have come to support the creation theory because as they study 'Creation -vs- Evolution' they have found that there are more 'holes' in the evolution theory than there are in 'Creation'.

Both Creationism and Evolution start with presuppositions. Evolution starts with the presupposition that God, if He exists, played no part in the development of species, but that they developed by macro-evolution or chance mutations that resulted in benefit to the organisms; Creationism presumes that He created all species, and that there are minor adaptions which occur naturally, called micro-evolution.

Answer

If you are seeking the kind of proof that will stand up under objective scrutiny, you won't find any. There is no scientific proof whatsoever that God created man, or that He even exists. Nothing at all. This despite the best efforts of a misguided group who would twist scientific "facts" to the contrary. Belief in God is a concept that we will either deny or accept based on faith and not on anything else. That is the nature of the acceptance of a Higher Power. Belief, the handmaiden of faith, is something that could be "learned" from childhood. Or it could be "naturally acquired" later in life. Or the whole of the teachings of religion could be rejected for whatever reason.

The great wonder of religion is that it asks us for so much and returns nothing "tangible" except perhaps the good feelings in our hearts. And, though there are clearly a number of unexplainable phenomenon that have been recorded, no "saving grace" or "miracles" can be shown definitively to be sent down to us from on high. Yet people still believe. We find that faith is a great motivator and an engine of will. Whether it is the Hand of God that is exemplified by, say, the passing out of food and warm clothing to the homeless in winter, or the Fist of Allah that metes out Justice through individuals with explosive devices strapped to their bodies. For something that is not available by the liter, ounce or tonne, it is a most extraordinary product, and one that individuals have invested their whole lives in. Have given their whole lives for. Have died for. By choice.

The desire to investigate the nature of faith and belief in God is innate. We all carry that curiosity within us. Some would say that it is imprinted on us by God. Certainly there is no proof that this is not the case. His gifts, whatever form an individual chooses to see them in, are immutable tokens that bespeak the contents of the heart of the receiver upon whom they are visited. If you believe, if you are a believer, you need no proof of the existence of God or of His most Divine Power. And no one can prove to you in any empirical way that you are wrong. No one.

Another View:

The proof is within man itself. Embedded is his very genetic code. Evolution is like changing clothes to suit the environment. When God created man, He put inside him all he needed to survive. When the earth was still young the environment was savage. To survive, brute is needed and so God clothed man with brute, allowed his genetic structure to change, to be able to survive thus yielding those early human fossils we are discovering right now. Whose brains were smaller than ours since a large brain is not yet needed to survive - only strong physical structure. And as the world changes, God allowed man to grow larger brain to accumulate more knowledge which in turn allowed man to survive not with brute force but by knowledge. In turn man lose his brute physical structure, since he does not need it anymore, becoming more and more into the form we are now. Studies show that the changes that happens inside our body is not the introduction of new genetic code but it is the restructuring of old genetic codes to suit the need. So in short, we are still what we were before in the beginning. So therefore evolution is a part of creation. It is God's way of improving us.

Jewish Answer: For the majority of Jews (including Orthodox), there is no conflict between the story of creation found in the Torah and the theory of evolution. The reason for this is that the Torah tells us WHAT God did, not the how of what He did.

Jewish answer 2:

The short answer is that religion and its beliefs cannot be absolutely proven, just as evolution cannot; otherwise everyone would believe in it.

However, if you read "Shattering the Myths of Darwinism" (Park Street press, 2000), or "Darwin on Trial" (Intervarsity press, 1993), you'll likely be well on the way to seeing the question in a new light.

Note also that the evidence of God's creation is not limited to the Bible. All ancient societies believed in a supernatural source for the universe: it's a worldwide tradition.

No Actually everything in creationism is based on real science. Also young earth creationism is easily explained by the fact that I believe most dating methods used by scientists today are flawed. Many have been proved to have huge inconsistencies many times over. I remember one experiment where the age of a newly created volcano crust was dated and it came back millions of years old when in fact it was less then 20. And also the recent discovery of dinosaur bones with blood in them show a different story, as many know blood cannot last millions of years. What this shows is that the whole foundation of the archeology timeline is flawed and that the earth is much younger then originally believed. That in fact the world isn't millions of years old but thousands. I'll put up some links to back my claims, one has pictures so you can see it with your own eyes.

Also there was a recent discovery of rings in rocks with a radioactive compound that has a half life of less then a second proves that it was created in less then a second. As the rings wouldn't exist if it was created after it had vanished. Many people believe that this happened because it was deposited by a kind of sap, but this would only account for the rings on the surface, not the rings inside the rock itself.

As you can see everything in Creationism is based on science. I would suggest that you find a movie called "Creation in the Symphony" which shows a lot of the theory and science behind creation. One great line from the movie is "The probability that evolution is true is the same probability that a whirlwind would blow into a junkyard and construct a Boeing 747 and send it flying out the other side"

In fact one reason evolution requires the alleged long time frames is that because we don't see evolution happening before our eyes it is assumed it can occur over the longer time period. This kind of argumentation is frequently used by evolutionists. It has been likened to a salesman who makes a loss on every sale but assumes he can make a profit if he makes a major increase in his sales volume. This ignores the scientific facts of Genetics, which show definite limits to change and no mechanism for new information to arise in the genetic code of an organism.

Further to this, genetics, particularly human genetics, shows there are now around 4000 known genetic disorders. The human genome is thus not evolving into something better but is deteriorating over time. Actual science points to a 'very good' creation which is in decay. If it was as old as stated by evolutionists we probably would not be here.

It is also wrong to assume that it is scientific knowledge which refutes creationism. Scientific knowledge, when all the facts are considered, supports young-earth creationism and refutes evolution. If evolution is true then it would fit all the facts and there would be no need to ignore an 'inconvenient truth.' Creationism is also not 'true by default'. It just happens to fit the evidence, all the evidence, better.

Answer

Yes Creationism is not a science. It is based on an inherently religious claim and posits a diametrically opposed view based on that which cannot be tested by science.

• To say that scientific knowledge do not refute creationism is to claim that hundreds of thousands of scientists around the world, all with substantial knowledge of evolution and the facts and data surrounding it, are wrong.
• To say that creationism fits all the evidence is completely incorrect. Radio-isotope dating, fossil record, genetic comparison and functioning, comparative anatomy, comparative behaviour, ... are all denied by creationism. Yet, they are shown correct by hundreds of experiments, by a multitude of research. If anything, creationism twists the facts it chooses, and denies all others.
• To say that because genetic disorders are increasing means nothing. We allow these people to survive, we protect them and feed them and shelter them; in nature, they would have been killed off within months of birth, thus removing such disorders from the gene pool. A simple glance at the creatures in the natural world, without this defense, shows that genetic disorders are so rare as to be miracles when a specimen is found; for example, the albino great white shark.
• To say that evolution requires huge time frames is not entirely true. It requires huge numbers of successive generations; while for many organisms this is equivalent, for things like viruses, bacteria, even flies and insects (which all reproduce quickly enough to see the differences) we can visually observe that evolution, defined by change in alleleic frequency and survival of the fittest/natural selection, is occurring. This is replicable in both the lab and in nature.
• To say that evolution has an enormously low probability is to say that everything does. Yet it still happens. As to comparing evolution to a 747 appearing from nothing, the argument fails to understand how evolution works; it does not go from A to Z in one jump, but creeps there using hundreds of very small ones.
• Perhaps the best example of the vast errors in creationism: "I believe". Creationism is based on religious belief. It starts with a conclusion - i.e. "God did it this way" - and then attempts to prove this, despite longstanding evidence to the contrary. It does the same with current science; it concludes that this knowledge must be incorrect, and then goes about attempting to prove so.
• If creationism was so correct, then scientists would accept it as such. But it isn't, because it doesn't fit the facts, it doesn't work as science and it doesn't make sense.