Earth science curriculum tailored to fit wavering fundamentalists

Could you please boil down your voluminous posts to the essential point, whether silt could ride on the flood waters or not?

Well, it was really none of my business anyway but thanks for the answer. I have a bigger problem with the "Christians" who come here to argue with me rather than support me than with the antiChristians. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Well, actually Faith it is NOT a matter of interpretation.We can determine whether or not two rock samples (or teeth or trees or people) came from the same area by comparing their composition in detail. It is a science called chemistry.We know that sand is an end product and how it is produced, for example by weathering rocks to produce the type sand that is the result of mountains being eroded.We can know how long it takes by observing the processes as it goes on today.We can know that 40 days and 40 nights of rain cannot weather much rock away or make much sand since we can directly see what tens of thousands of years of 24 hour a day racing water does to granite. Remember the picture I posted that showed the boulders sitting at the base of Niagara Falls.Just as with the Green River varves, the salt beds, the White Cliffs of Dover, there is and has never been a single model or method that can explain their existence in only 6000 much less 4300 years. There is no model or method that could wear down the Appalachians in only 6000 years.YEC and Creationism are simply DeadOnArrival.

While you could argue this for science in the 21st century, it's not true of the birth of modern science in the 17th century. Bacon, Kepler, and Galileo, were all devout theists. As the early scientific enterprise grew, the early scientists (or "virtuosi" in the parlance of 17th century England) tended to be not only theists, but Christians. And not only Christians, but Protestants. And not only Protestants, but Puritans, with theological views similar to those that you yourself hold. As Ian Barbour has written (Ian G. Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1966), 48):

quote:

---

Without belittling advances that occurred elsewhere, one can say that seventeenth-century England was the turning point in the history of science, and that the Puritans were its chief agents. Seven out of ten members of the Royal Society were Puritans--a ratio far out of proportion to the population as a whole; most of the virtuosi were active churchmen, and many of the clergy encouraged or themselves took part in scientific pursuits."
  —Ian Barbour

---

As Whitehead and others have argued, it was the Christian (especially Puritan) conception of God's unchanging character and God's providence that motivated these early scientists to study God's creation to try to uncover the truths which He had revealed there. But it is the hard sciences (geology, physics, astrophysics) which provide the strongest support for an old earth and an old universe!Edited by kbertsche, : No reason given.

Yes, I know. The development of science in the west could be attributed entirely to Bible-believing Christians, due to the Biblical presentation of a law-giving God and a lawful Nature, which wasn't the way the world was conceived by the pagans. The conception of law made it possible to expect to understand Nature. And that was a very productive idea for the most part, until Hutton and Darwin started making claims about the untestable past. Absolutely. But that's REAL science. Sorry, but evolution and old earth geology are NOT real science. If it contradicts the Bible, and it does, it's not science. It is far more dangerous to contradict God's word than it is to contradict science. Nature and the Bible must agree, as you said, but what human beings think about Nature is subject to error. And when you get into the sciences of the past you are relying mostly on mere interpretation, that is nothing but fallible human ponderings, not real science, not testable, not replicable, just mental constructs. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Though I *may* disagree with many of their spiritual conclusions (big deal), I have great respect for scientists like kbertsche, Francis Collins, and countless other religious scientists. I respect them because while in spiritual matters they follow their heart (or whatever explanation works for them), in matters of science they follow the evidence.One cannot practice science if in the scientific matter in question you have a sacred cow (ANY sacred cow). If your field is dendrochronology and you insist that trees always and without fail produce one single ring per year and spend your time hand waving away the evidence to the contrary, you aren't doing science, you're doing pseudoscience. The difference between the answer of Nye and the answer of Ham on what would change their minds regarding evolution made this starkly clear. Bill can do, judge and rationally comment on earth science - Ken can't. It's simply a matter of the definition and integrity of science.My curriculum is not anti-creation, it's anti-YEC and anti-Noahic flood - something undoubtedly false if one is willing to follow the evidence. If one has the position that evidence contrary to their own pet interpretation of a text they deem holy must necessarily be flawed or ignored or hand waved away through ad hoc explanations, they are not using a scientific approach. One does not get to make up one's own definition of 'science' and then try to palm it off as real science.Asking nicely - biblical pseudoscience is off topic on this thread. Please.JBEdited by ThinAirDesigns, : No reason given.

The only "sacred cow" here IS science. If people stop addressing me on this thread, I'll leave. I have no interest in being here except to answer the endless garbage that's thrown at me.To be "anti YEC" is to be anti Biblical which is to be anti Christian which is to be anti God which is to be anti Truth.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

That's a theological position. Please take your theological position, observations and theories to a thread whose topic allows it.Thanks
JB

I disengaged from you pages ago and am I am only interacting with you at this time to highlight your off topic statements to the moderators.That "endless garbage" you think is being thrown is actual science, backed up by evidence, while your assertions are by your own admission based on something completely different.Please take your biblical pseudoscience to a thread where such is appropriate. Yes, science IS the holy cow on this thread. Please respect that.Thanks.JBEdited by ThinAirDesigns, : No reason given.

Ah... still nothing of subtance, just complaints. Not really. Since the higher-grade metamorphic rocks are present at the surface, it is reasonable to assume that they were actually once at a much greater depth.

Well, then, you were wrong. You said that it was due to the type of mountain range.Now it has to do with the rate of erosion.And actually, I agree. Higher mountain ranges are subject to higher rates of erosion. When the Himalayas are the same elevation as the Appalachians, they will be eroding at a similar rate. I have no idea what you are trying to say here. Have you seen cross-sections of the southern Appalachians? Yes, it would be an interpretation of the evidence.What have you got?Oh, that's right. If we disagree with you we are crazy.That makes sense.

I've started a thread for the off topic discussion HERE Please move posts addressed to me over there. Thanks.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Much appreciated and respect given for the move.JB

Because of an off thread conversation I just had, I realized that I used one of the terms above in a way that does not accurately reflect my position. If the Noahic flood is interpreted as a regional event, I have no issue whatsoever with the story. It's the world-wide aspect of it that doesn't fit the evidence.I will try in the future to make sure I'm more clear.Thanks
JBEdited by ThinAirDesigns, : No reason given.

okaaay step by step ... Air born silt can land and float on water due to surface tension, not because of any relative buoyancy of the particles. Until the first wave, spray or rain drop lands on it.Then it becomes suspended in the water.Silt suspended in water settles only if the water is not turbulent, and then only very slowly ... 10,000 times slower than a 10mm (~3/8") diameter pebble (smaller than a marble).Any flow of water that keeps a 10mm diameter pebble in suspension will pick up (erode) any silt resting on the bottom.Ergo you need an extended period of tranquility to form a layer of silt deposition on a surface ... if formed in the water.An extended period of time without any larger particles in the water column over the silt layer or they would be deposited before the silt formed a layer.Enjoy ThinAirDesigns: possible experiment: take marbles to a pool and time how long it takes for them to reach the bottom. You can get them in various sizes -- 1/2", 9/16", 5/8", 3/4", 1" ... http://glassmarbles.com/size.htm These would be the same density, with nice smooth spherical surfaces, you could weigh them and then calculate the density. You should get a nice distribution of time vs size from dropping them in the deep end of a swimming pool.