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Author Topic:   Moses predicting Creation?
Ragged
Member (Idle past 3578 days)
Posts: 47
From: Purgatory
Joined: 10-26-2005


Message 1 of 7 (516893)
07-28-2009 2:38 AM


Recentely I was talking to someone about Creation and heard that apparantely when Moses lists the 7 steps of creation of the world he puts the events in correct order with regard to scientific knowledge today. This is supposably supported by scietists and thereby presents evidence that Moses must have learned about it from God, because the probability of guessing randomly is so low.
Here is an exsert from one of the websites:
"From there, the following takes place:
-The creation of the earth itself
-The separation of the dry land from the seas
-The creation of plants in a particular order - grasses, shrubs and trees
-The placing of the heavenly bodies in relationship to the earth
-The creation of animal life in a particular order - fish, birds, land animals
-The creation of man
As scientists study the creation of the universe and life on earth, they
have found that it happened in exactly that order."
Twelve Events Science Has Confirmed Prove the Biblical Creation Account
The first stage, for example, when God separates the dark from the light is parralled with decoupling.
This website is even more thorough in explaining it.
Does God Exist? - Home Page
I am wondering whether this argument holds water? I myself think that when Moses (or whoever) wrote about creation of the world he intuitevely listed events from the most basic to the most complex. The only reason that he got those events somewhat close was because our world also tends to evolve from basic to complex.
I don't know much about science (other than a few things I read about BB and Evolution) so I don't know how much scientific support this argument really has. So to all of you guys who know more about science than me (which should be great majority of you) please contribute your thoughts. Thanks.
(spelling mistakes are because I currentely don't have access to Word.)

Replies to this message:
 Message 4 by Huntard, posted 07-28-2009 10:11 AM Ragged has not replied
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 Message 6 by Dr Jack, posted 07-28-2009 10:34 AM Ragged has not replied
 Message 7 by caffeine, posted 07-28-2009 10:55 AM Ragged has not replied

  
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Message 2 of 7 (516909)
07-28-2009 8:04 AM


Ragged writes:
(spelling mistakes are because I currentely don't have access to Word.)
The Firefox and Chrome browsers both have built in spell checkers.
If you use Internet Explorer, then Google has a spell checker included with it's browser toolbar that works with it, see Google Toolbar.

--Percy
EvC Forum Director

  
Admin
Director
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Message 3 of 7 (516911)
07-28-2009 8:05 AM


Thread Copied from Proposed New Topics Forum
Thread copied here from the Moses predicting Creation? thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

  
Huntard
Member (Idle past 2321 days)
Posts: 2870
From: Limburg, The Netherlands
Joined: 09-02-2008


Message 4 of 7 (516934)
07-28-2009 10:11 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Ragged
07-28-2009 2:38 AM


Ragged writes:
I am wondering whether this argument holds water?
No not really. First of all, which creaation account is being used and why? Gen 1 and Gen 2 differ. Second, even if we were to go with your list, ther's still some wrong things in there, for example:
-The separation of the dry land from the seas
There were no seas when the Earth first formed. They only came later, so there was nothing to seperate.
-The placing of the heavenly bodies in relationship to the earth
The heavenly bodies (including our Sun) were there before the Earth. This is also wrong in conjunction wit the point before this one, about the plants, they of course came after the Earth, so this point should be before all the others on this list.
-The creation of animal life in a particular order - fish, birds, land animals
There were land animals before there were birds.
nyway, moving on.
I myself think that when Moses (or whoever) wrote about creation of the world he intuitevely listed events from the most basic to the most complex. The only reason that he got those events somewhat close was because our world also tends to evolve from basic to complex.
That's probably what happened, yes. It would also explain some of the errors (the heavenly bodies look very small, and thus not so complex compared to the "vastness" of Earth. Also, birds look smaller then most large land animals known to people then and there, so they must've come first too.
I don't know much about science (other than a few things I read about BB and Evolution) so I don't know how much scientific support this argument really has.
It's probably none at all to very little. This won't stop the creationists from claiming otherwise, though.

I hunt for the truth

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Ragged, posted 07-28-2009 2:38 AM Ragged has not replied

  
bluescat48
Member (Idle past 4215 days)
Posts: 2347
From: United States
Joined: 10-06-2007


Message 5 of 7 (516935)
07-28-2009 10:33 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Ragged
07-28-2009 2:38 AM


Recentely I was talking to someone about Creation and heard that apparantely when Moses lists the 7 steps of creation of the world he puts the events in correct order with regard to scientific knowledge today. This is supposably supported by scietists and thereby presents evidence that Moses must have learned about it from God, because the probability of guessing randomly is so low.
Here is an exsert from one of the websites:
"From there, the following takes place:
-The creation of the earth itself
-The separation of the dry land from the seas
-The creation of plants in a particular order - grasses, shrubs and trees
-The placing of the heavenly bodies in relationship to the earth
-The creation of animal life in a particular order - fish, birds, land animals
-The creation of man
As scientists study the creation of the universe and life on earth, they
have found that it happened in exactly that order."
Except that the order of events in science does not agree at all.
Most of the 'Heavenly bodies existed long before the earth and other members of the sun's family.
The moon & earth formed at a similar time.
The order of life does not match the order listed at the given website.
The creation of animal life in a particular order - fish, birds, land animals
The order that is accepted by most scientists would be fish, primitive land animals, primitive mammals, primitive birds.
all of this before
he creation of plants in a particular order - grasses, shrubs and trees
the earliest plants, in the order, algae, bryophytes, ferns & fern allies, gynosperms before the above list which are angiosperms.
The list above lists no protokaryotes (eubacteria & archaea) at all.
ref. The Ancestor's Tale, chap 39, Richard Dawkins.

There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002
Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969
Since Evolution is only ~90% correct it should be thrown out and replaced by Creation which has even a lower % of correctness. W T Young, 2008

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Ragged, posted 07-28-2009 2:38 AM Ragged has not replied

  
Dr Jack
Member
Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
Member Rating: 8.4


Message 6 of 7 (516936)
07-28-2009 10:34 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Ragged
07-28-2009 2:38 AM


-The creation of the earth itself
Well, yeah, but that's hardly a rocking prediction: Wow! The thing that all the other things are on came first! Oh, the insight.
The separation of the dry land from the seas
What does seperation mean? The seas formed before the other stuff
The creation of plants in a particular order - grasses, shrubs and trees
This is wrong, grasses are a comparitively recent, shrubs and trees predate them by several hundred million years.
The placing of the heavenly bodies in relationship to the earth
Huh? The biblical account of creation includes confused notions of the "heavens" being made of water, and the stars being lights that only happen at night.
The creation of animal life in a particular order - fish, birds, land animals
This is wrong, land animals predate birds.
The creation of man
Yeah, but it also claims man was created before woman, and from dirt.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Ragged, posted 07-28-2009 2:38 AM Ragged has not replied

  
caffeine
Member (Idle past 1050 days)
Posts: 1800
From: Prague, Czech Republic
Joined: 10-22-2008


Message 7 of 7 (516938)
07-28-2009 10:55 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Ragged
07-28-2009 2:38 AM


Plenty of others posted basically the same while I was writing this, but I've written it now so it's appearing anyway.
I've never understood why the claim that the order of creation in genesis matches scientific understanding of the way things happen is so widespread. It's easily refuted by opening any book on the natural history of earth, including the book your first link cites as supporting evidence.
The creation of the sun and moon are probably the most glaringly out of place parts, but I'll just deal with the order of lifeforms appearing here. Firsty we have plants (before the sun). I don't read in Genesis the progression suggested in your link (grasses -> herbs -> trees), as they all just seem to appear together. But let's assume for a moment that's what's meant.
The early fossil record of grasses is sparse, but they're generally considered to have arisen some time in the late Cretaceous, less than 100 million years ago.
'Herb' is just a term for plants humans make use of due to their flavour. As a result, it's not really possible to say when they first evolved. Who knows what mesozoic plants tasted like? Using their mention as evidence for things appearing in the right order seems odd.*
'Tree' is also quite a wide category, though it's one based on morphology rather than flavour, so we can say with more confidence when they first appeared. The earliest trees we have evidence of are the ferns and horsetails that made up the great forests of the Carboniferous period. Note that this means trees appeared something like 300 million years before grasses. The order of plants in Genesis categorically does not match that uncovered by scientific inquiry.
Next, we move on to the creation of animal life. The Bible lists
things slightly differently than your link:
First comes fish and other creatures of the sea - sometimes whales
depending on your translation. We'll be generous and ignore the
whales. The fossil record of the earliest fishes are sparse, but they've been around since at least the ordovician period (488-444 million years ago). This is before the trees and grasses discussed above; in fact before any plants settled on land at all.
Next come birds. Birds are more recent than fish, and trees, appearing somewhere 150 million years ago or a bit later, depending on your definition of 'bird'. They're probably older than grasses, but this is difficult to verify.
Next come the beasts of the earth. Bit of a vague one, but we'll take it to mean land vetebrates. The earliest of these crawled on to the land something like 350 million years ago, long before there were any birds or grasses.
After this cattle arrive. 'Cattle' usually only refers to domesticated animals, which obviously needed humans to domesticate them first. We'll take a broader definition, probably that meant by the authors, and just looked at hoofed mammals instead. These animals are believed to have evolved only after the extinction of the dinosaurs - possibly somewhere between 55 and 60 million years ago. This makes them the youngest of everything considered so far, so we finally have something that fits in the right place.
But wait! Next, God goes on to create every 'creeping thing'. Assuming creeping thing refers to bugs and insects, then we're back to buggering up natural history as we know it. There are fossils that appear to be the tracks of arthropods on land dating back as far as 510 million years ago. Pneumodesmus newmani is the first land bug we have a body fossil of, and this little thing was creeping around Scotland around 428 million years ago, before cattle, before the beasts of the land, and before the birds.
The Genesis creation story doesn't eerily match what science has uncovered. It was written by men who didn't know what we know now, and their guesses don't even appear to be close.
*ABE - I've noticed your link wrote 'shrubs', not 'herbs'. Sorry, I was reading from the King Jame's Version.
Edited by caffeine, : No reason given.

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