There Has Forever Been A Universe

Whether you're a bigbangist, a oldearthevolly, or a youngearthcreashist, you have that nagging question/problem of "What before." So for both ideologies, this,imo, is the only compatible answer to your dilema.For the bigbangist, your only solution to the problem of the first existence of something is that there has always been something.For the creationist of either the young earth or the old earth persuasion, the problem becomes more complex:
1. If you have no universe before Genesis 1, you have no Biblical eternal God Jehovah, who scripture says is "the same yesterday, today, and forever," for if there was ever a beginning of the universe (everything existing) then you have a strange god floating out there in empty space with nothing around him and nothing to do for all eternity previous to "creation." Not even a throne to sit on. Certainly this doesn't cut it with being "the same yesterday, today and forever," as the text states.2. Imo, God has been creating and destroying things in his eternal universe forever to suit his good pleasure and plan.3. Genesis one, one states that God created the heavens and the earth. That, imo is a prefacing statement for what follows. What it is saying is this: "Whenever heaven and earth began it was God who made it." Period. That's all this opening statement is saying.
Then in the verses of Genesis chapter one and two to follow, God explains what he did with/to the earth which he had at some time, unknown to man, created.4. The sun and the moon were, according to the text, created subsequent to day 3 and before day four ended.5. Since the earth was alread present in day one, the earth preceeded the sun, moon and stars. This brings up the question, "Which stars?"
The heaven and earth of Genesis one, imo has to be refering to the heavens pertaining to the earth. That is logically our Milky Way Galexy.6. The text says the sun and moon originated the measurement of days, years and seasons. So we MUST, imo, assume from this that the length of days, years, and seasons before day 5 is UNKNOWN TO MAN, since (a)nobody knows how long day four was before the work of day four was finished. and (b) Days one, two and three have no specified length either of the "evenings and mornings" of these days.The text, imo, gives the exact length of days 5 and 6 in which the animals, birds, and mankind was created. Those days and all the days subsequent to that were measured by the sun, i.e. 24 hours, consisting each, first of an "evening" of relatively darkness and secondly, "morning," of relatively daylight.There's a starter. What do you think?[This message has been edited by buzsaw, 03-15-2003]

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The text, imo, gives the exact length of days 5 and 6 in which the animals, birds, and mankind was created. Those days and all the days subsequent to that were measured by the sun, i.e. 24 hours, consisting each, first of an "evening" of relatively darkness and secondly, "morning," of relatively daylight.

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There's a starter. What do you think?

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What I think is that you are ignoring the findings of physics, paleontology, biology, and chemistry over the last couple of centuries to fit a worldview based on an old book.

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What I think is that you are ignoring the findings of physics, paleontology, biology, and chemistry over the last couple of centuries to fit a worldview based on an old book

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If the Genesis record is true, the flood was the first rain and the atmosphere would be such that our dating methods would not work for pre-flood things. For one thing there would be far less carbon 14 produced. Things would test much older than they really are.

That the earth, or more precisely the fossil-bearing rocks of the earth, are at least several million years old was evident to those who made a study of it by about 1840. There is far too much rock, with fossils unique to many layers of it, to have formed in just a few thousands or even hundreds of thousands of years. The amount of biogenic or "fossil" limestone alone would have taken huge amounts of time to form - not only must you have the time and nutrients to grow enough clams and coral reefs and coccolithophorids to make the rock, but you have to get rid of the carbon dioxide that its formation releases.
Be specific about the dating methods that "would not work for pre-flood things." Which wouldn't work and why? Potassium-argon? Argon-argon? Samarium-neodymium? Strontium-rubidium? Uranium/thorium - lead? Which of those have anything at all to do with a "pre-flood" atmosphere at 400 degrees and only a percent or two oxygen content because it was mostly water vapor?

Morris's ICR at ElCajon, Ca has produced an excellent video on how the Geological Column does not fit well in the Grand Canyon and another on the sudden layering and sedimentation of the Mt St Hellens Volcanoe canyon which the volcanoe cut overnight.With little use for fire, no nitrogen producing lightening, no forest fires, long life, and other factors, the carbon14/nitrogen14 dating, imo, wouldn't work for testing over about 3500 years or so (if there was indeed a flood)I've read some strong arguments on the uranium tests(the specifics of which I can't recall), but don't know enough about the others to comment until I could do some research on them.

THere is just one little problem, in that carbon dating is NOT take for granted, it is tested. Dendrochronology is the best known but there are other methods such ice cores and varve counting. All of these methods go back more than 10,000 years.

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THere is just one little problem, in that carbon dating is NOT take for granted, it is tested. Dendrochronology is the best known but there are other methods such ice cores and varve counting. All of these methods go back more than 10,000 years.

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But how would a test compensate with the different atmosphere the world would have if there where a flood and if there were a vapor eanopy over the earth previous to the flood? The nitrogen/carbon factors would be unknown for a test.

The exact level of 14C is the atmosphere of 20,000 years ago is not precisely knowable, so the 14C clock is instead calibrated to actual knowable (within reasonable error) ages instead. There is no need to "compensate" for anything. Dendrochronology is one: tree rings in living trees are matched up in the patterns they show to rings in preserved logs in bogs or ancient structures - rings form a continuous record back about 11,000 years in Europe. 14C dates can be done on the same trees to calibrate the radiocarbon dates to true dates.
Similarly, a couple of lakes in Japan have yearly alternations of light (winter) and dark (summer) layers (varves) in their bottom sediments, back to about 40,000 years ago. In one of these, 250 samples (leaves, insect parts, etc) were carbon 14 dated and compared to the actual physical count of layers. See Kitigawa and van der Plicht, Science, vol 279, pp 1187-1190 (1998).
Annual layers in ice from Greenland, Antarctica, Peru, Bolivia, and Mt Kilimanjaro in Africa have been used as calibrators, too.
Other radioactive dating methods that don't depend on 14C production agree with 14C dates: thorium/uranium dates from stalagmites, for instance, in France or Nevada.
I can find references for several if you'll actually look at them. By the way: A "vapor canopy" might have once existed, but is quite incompatible with life.

The test doesn't HAVE to compensate for your supposed factors because it COMPARES the carbon date with an independantly determined date (counting tree rings, ice core layers or varves).And we find that there is no sign of any factor that would have a major effect. So not only does the tests NOT have to compensate for it, they SHOW that the only compensations needed are minor and can be accounted for by the normal variations in C14 production.What is more there is no good reason to believe that a flood would cause significant variations, nor that there ever was a "vapour canopy" at any time relevant to carbon dating.

Neither Henry Morris nor the ICR are reliable sources of scientific information.Their stated mission is to convert people to their religious cause, not to advance scientific understanding of nature.They are a religious group that ignores or twists any evidence which contradicts their particular interpretation of a particular version of the Christian Bible.[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 03-21-2003]

I do not see what was prior to creation as being anything of importance to us, that to me would be God's problem... and none the less God can not be contained by the universe... This probably is one of the biggest mysteries... Well I pray that if God would reveal this to us than let him do so in his time.

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Neither Henry Morris nor the ICR are reliable sources of scientific information.
Their stated mission is to convert people to their religious cause, not to advance scientific understanding of nature.

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ICR's videos on the Grand Canyon and on Mt St. Helens depict a scientific interpretation of what is observed at these two locations which, at least, offers a sensible argument for the global flood. The Grand Canyon video documents sediment layers inconsistent with the geological column as well as a topography indicating that at one time there could have been a large body of water above the canyon which suddenly broke loose and cut the canyon. in the Mt. St. Helens video of the significant canyon cut by it, there is some interesting layering patterns visible, showing a fairly good model of what could have happened at the Grand Canyon on a much larger scale.I have viewed both videos and though I don't agree with all ICR teaches, imo, these are impressive arguments for the flood. The data offered in these videos is clearly more scientific than evangelistic.

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I do not see what was prior to creation as being anything of importance to us, that to me would be God's problem... and none the less God can not be contained by the universe... This probably is one of the biggest mysteries... Well I pray that if God would reveal this to us than let him do so in his time.

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Hi JL.
Possibly you would agree with me that what we actually read in Genesis one is as foundational to creationism as pillars are to a large bridge. Imo, young earth creationists who are claiming that the entirety of the observed universe began a mere six milleniums ago or so, are presenting a huge credibility problem which pictures their eternal majesty of the universe in a very small and temporal framework.
1. We Christians continually remind one another that our god, Jehovah, god of the Bible, is the "same yesterday, today, and forever."
2. If we stop a few minutes and ponder what that implies, imo, we MUST conclude that a few thousand years is relatively a few blinks of his eye and that if he is the creator today, he must have been the creator forever, having a universe around him. He simply could not be a very impressive god if he were floating around in space with nothing around him and nothing to do for all eternity previous to this little heartbeat of a mere six thousand years.I would welcome any comment you would care to offer on any of the specifics of my opening post to this thread.

"1. If you have no universe before Genesis 1, you have no Biblical eternal God Jehovah, who scripture says is "the same yesterday, today, and forever," for if there was ever a beginning of the universe (everything existing) then you have a strange god floating out there in empty space with nothing around him and nothing to do for all eternity previous to "creation." Not even a throne to sit on. Certainly this doesn't cut it with being "the same yesterday, today and forever," as the text states. "It appears to me that you are giving the universe the respect that God deserves here, I believe that the universe itself cannot contain God...and with his eternal nature we probably can not fathom what other things there are to do without material things... somewhere in Ecclessiastes it says that we would not know the mystery from the time of the beginning till the time of the end because God put the love of the world in our hearts...(it is in our nature to grieve when someone dies, but to God what he sees is sheltered from us, except in some very miraculous circumstances)
and a my comment on "the same yesterday, today and forever," has more to do with the Spirit of God... 1 John 4:8... God is love... never did he not love and never will he not love."2. Imo, God has been creating and destroying things in his eternal universe forever to suit his good pleasure and plan."The evidence for this is nil at the best and is based on pure speculative philosophy... as Christians we are called to capture our thoughts to the obedience of Christ...(this area I need prayer in)"3. Genesis one, one states that God created the heavens and the earth. That, imo is a prefacing statement for what follows. What it is saying is this: "Whenever heaven and earth began it was God who made it." Period. That's all this opening statement is saying.
Then in the verses of Genesis chapter one and two to follow, God explains what he did with/to the earth which he had at some time, unknown to man, created. "I would disagree that Genesis 1:1 is a prefacing statement but rather is the litteral first creative act of God... I imagine a formless ball of water much like we learn an amoeba to be shaped like when we were children in school, and God's Spirit containing this water, than he creates light which I believe to be the phenomena called Gravity, which than made the formless earth that was water into a ball, the Gravity that took place on this day was unlike any that has ever happened since that time.... so none the less I see the first two chapters of Genesis to be an ongoing dialogue of Creation with no prefacing statement... but I do agree that God is the only creator period... and Jesus is that God( scripturally we see this in a portion of Colossians?)"4. The sun and the moon were, according to the text, created subsequent to day 3 and before day four ended."agreed"5. Since the earth was alread present in day one, the earth preceeded the sun, moon and stars. This brings up the question, "Which stars?"
The heaven and earth of Genesis one, imo has to be refering to the heavens pertaining to the earth. That is logically our Milky Way Galexy. "The heavens and earth of Genesis 1 I disagree are not refering to the heavens pertaining to the earth as we know it today, but were reffering to the heavens pertaining to the earth as of that moment in time (the beginning of time) I believe this is what is referred to the heaven of the heavens, (where is that Paul talks of being caught up to the 3rd heavens and all those other verses of heaven of heavens), the heaven I believe you to be reffering to came on day 2 and was called the firmament or expanse or sky."6. The text says the sun and moon originated the measurement of days, years and seasons. So we MUST, imo, assume from this that the length of days, years, and seasons before day 5 is UNKNOWN TO MAN, since (a)nobody knows how long day four was before the work of day four was finished. and (b) Days one, two and three have no specified length either of the "evenings and mornings" of these days."the text does not say that the sun, moon originated the measurement of days, years and seasons, but would be for measuring them... days, years and seasons were originated in by the will of God, it would seem fitting to me that God would impart a sense of time much like what he senses except that after the fall we became mortal man...
God knows the length of time and his scriptures state them to be a regular day that is experienced, to me a loving God would not confuse us with different lengths of days from him to us whom are made in his image...(the 2 Peter passage that has the days to thousands of years thing has nothing to do with creation but everything to do with God's patience and is used as a way to show the difference between our patience and his)"The text, imo, gives the exact length of days 5 and 6 in which the animals, birds, and mankind was created. Those days and all the days subsequent to that were measured by the sun, i.e. 24 hours, consisting each, first of an "evening" of relatively darkness and secondly, "morning," of relatively daylight. "Again I have to add to this, because of my belief that time is not measured by the sun but rather inderectly by the phenomena of gravity, we use the rotations of the earth around the sun to measure this phenomena... the sun only burns because of this phenomena, the moon circles the earth because of this phenomena...

Yes, we all believe many things