How old did the Garden of Eden appear on Day 7?

Very true. I did not think this was relevant to the current discussion, but you are correct. Birds and aquatic creatures were originally formed from the waters of the sea. Sure, I was in somewhat of a hurry last post and didn't have time to go back and insert it. Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaThat's not exactly what I was meant to convey. I was trying to say that those compounds which we consider to be "organic" (in the traditional since) are considered so only because they are the ones God chose pull out of the ground and use when He created life. These "organic" compounds are not necessarily dependent on living things for their formation. Many of them can already be formulated in labrotories. If we can formulate these compounds without using living things, wouldn't the one who created those compounds be able to do the same?To claim that God just put fake fossils in the ground is the same as claiming that organic compounds cannot be created in the absence of life. This has been clearly disproven through the field of organic chemistry.

Compounds like humic acids - common soil constituents - haven't even all been well characterized in the lab as of now, let alone synthesized. Many are derived from lignin which was once part of a living plant. The plant dies and bacteria and fungi digest or degrade the organics from it to leave this stuff behind. A fiendishly complicated material, in short, made up of probably thousands of different compounds. Wikipedia treats this subject, too.

Well, God would have been the one who put them into the ground in the first place, wouldn't He? That's what I'm kinda getting at: From our vantage point, those compounds get into the ground from the decomposition of living things. If God put those same compounds into the soil during the creation, then that soil would have the "appearance of age" - i.e. it would appear that living things had died and decomposed. Apparently, for some of them, living things are the only known natural source.The point of the OP seems to be to ask: did God create the soil with the appearance of age? That is, from our point of view, would the soil in the garden appear more than 7 days old? Nobody denies that some organic compounds can be created in the laboratory. But creating soil that looks like "regular" soil - i.e. soil containing the remains of living things, whether fossil remains or chemical remains - smacks of fakery.Incidentally, what you're saying seems to be the opposite of the arguments against abiogenesis. While the abiogenesis critics claim that some organic molecules cannot form abiotically, you say that the residue of life can be formed abiotically.(Kinda like fingerprints appearing without benefit of fingers. )

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Your point of view is not necessarily the same as anyone else's point of view, nor is it inherently true. You see the organic compounds in the soil of Eden and to you they have the appearance of age. I see the organic compounds in the soil of Eden and to me they are evidence that God created living things from the dust of the ground.When I was little, my parents bought me some toy guns that shot orange rubber darts, but they soon realized that they had a problem on their hands. You see, everytime that I would go outside to play with my dart guns, I would soon come running back in complaining that I had lost all of the darts. My parents would then come outside with me and see the darts sitting in plain view in the middle of the yard. They very quickly realized that I had inherited a slight colorblindness from my grandfather. From my viewpoint, the orange darts were the same color as the green grass, and it took me quite a while to realize that my viewpoint was flawed. For the longest time, I insisted that the darts were made with the appearance of the grass, but I finally realized that I had to abandon my viewpoint and admit the facts. The darts were orange, and the grass was green.From this, and many other such incidents in my past, I learned that appearances are fickle at best. My point of view is not necessariy the correct point of view, and I must always be willing to change it in light of the facts.You are trying to argue that God gave the ground the appearance of age, because that agrees with your point of view. I am trying to show a different, more accurate point of view. If you could see it from my point of view, you would realize that God did not cause an appearance of age. It is merely that you do not have a good vantage point.Edited by w_fortenberry, : No reason given.

I'm not talking about "my" point of view. I'm talking about the general human point of view - the scientific point of view, if you like. When we see soil that looks like the remains of living things, we do conclude that it probably was made of living things.You would not come to any other conclusion in any other circumstances. You're showing an apologetic point of view, the point of view that the soil could not have been made of living things, therefore it wasn't. There is no evidence to support that point of view.As I said before, you are trying to explain away fingerprints, claiming that they were not made by fingers.

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As evidenced by history, the general human point of view and the scientific point of view are seldom in perfect agreement. In this case, I have already given evidence to prove that the scientific point of view is that decay is not necessary for the presence of "organic" material. Plants do not need dead things in order to grow. They do need certain elements and compounds to be present in the soil, but science has shown that those elements and compounds could come from sources other than dead plants and animals.If the scientific point of view and the general human point of view disagre with each other, then one of them must be more correct than the other, and we should all change our own personal point of view to reflect which ever of the two is more correct.

Well, first off, one theological view is that no death existed, period, in the soil of the Garden of Eden, and so that soil would be considerably different, if that is the case, than the soil we look at today.a couple of questions:1. Should we consider the soil in the garden to be the same as the soil on the rest of the earth?2. What happened with the Fall when the soil changed, and death entered in? Did just the possibility of death enter in, and so corruption began, or did the program generating the reality we know of as the universe have death plugged into it as an active agent?Imo, you cannot discuss your OP without answering the possibilities for the 2 questions above.

What "evidence" have you given, besides assertions? Whether or not the nutrients "could" come from other sources is not the point. What science has shown is that many of the nutrients in the soil do come from dead plants and animals.You can not just claim that some of them "magically" appeared in the soil of Eden with no prior history. All you're saying is "God did it". The scientific point of view is that soil nutrients have a history. Your point of view is that God "poofed" Eden's nutrients into the soil. Take your own advice and change your point of view.

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Who said that death entered the guarden when the 'fall' happened? Show chapter and verse.It looks to me that mortality was already there, otherwise, there would not be the concern about man being able to eat from the fruit of eternal life.

In fact the whole tale makes no sense at all and makes GOD somewhat of an idiot if death was not already part of life. If death did not exist then why would GOD even create a Tree of Life?

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We've gone over this before, ad nauseum, but maybe you were not present?Paul, who knew the Law better than you and I, and who spoke the language, states in his letter to the Corinthians (I Corinthians 15:21). So the view of an extremely learned Jewish scholar, a Pharissee of the Pharissees until he became a Christian, is that the book of Genesis indicates that Adam's sin brought death into the world.Now, as I already alluded to, there are other theological views on the matter, and you are welcome to discuss them, but if we are going to discuss YEC views, certainly this is one of the primary beliefs and interpretations of how death came into the world for "Bible-believing Christians."There are some Bible believers that think this could refer to man alone, but both groups accept the Fall.

AH..so you are reading into it, with your personal prejudice, rather than following what the text says.Ok.Opps.. it was a response to randman http://EvC Forum: How old did the Garden of Eden appear on Day 7? -->EvC Forum: How old did the Garden of Eden appear on Day 7?Edited by ramoss, : No reason given.

No. The text says by man came death. You'd have to read into it something else and twist it around if you want to make it mean something else, but then again, I suspect you know that.But I also suspect you aren't interested in the truth anyway.

No.
God planted a garden. He must have known what kind of soil He was planting in. After all He had just formed a man from it not that long ago. If, say, a soil was nitrogen rich, and at that time the process was such that carbon was formed from that, rather than the other way round like we see plants take in carbon now, and produce, I think, nitrogen-- then the seed planted might do alright if it had water. And we are told it did. So, how it would have worked in the beginning of things would have to be different that how it works now.
Therefore I do not see how as that the thought entered Adam's head, that the soil looked old.