Creationism vs Evolution

Note: For the purposes of this post, when I say evolution, I am lumping it in with abiogenesis (life from non-life). Technically that's not true, but culturally, these terms are conflated constantly.
 
Creationism doesn't necessarily deny evolution, but it does have a different starting point than evolution. This is where the source of the debate starts and where the concepts of micro and macro evolution originate. Intelligent design on the other hand can agree with evolution except it will deny the abiogenesis claim and still believe that some sort of intelligence crafted the first cell.

A depiction of the antediluvian (pre-flood) world.

As opposed to intelligent design, creationism more points to the Bible as an explanation for the origins of the world and mankind. I have never personally verified the validity of the 6000 year claim, but if you do accept a Genesis account, it is really hard to believe that mankind evolved over millions of years from single celled organisms. Noah's flood is also used to help explain certain problems such as dinosaurs, geological features, and other matters that are hard to explain with such a small timetable. I don't want to get too in depth into this, but there are some fascinating theories. The problem with all of these theories is that it is virtually impossible to substantiate these theories (like the world having an ocean of water in the sky), and that all of their "evidence" is derived from the Bible. If you don't accept the Bible as an authority, there's no reason to take these theories seriously. Although the theories will compel you to take a closer look at Genesis. There are some details that were certainly skipped over in Sunday School.


To be totally blunt, the biggest issue with creationism is that it simply isn't scientific; however, this doesn't make their claims untrue - just nearly impossible to prove. In order to be scientific, there has to be a falsifiable claim. Interestingly, both intelligent design and abiogenesis are not scientific either for this same reason. Evolution does not have this problem and thus is a compelling argument, but I do have some issues that I have yet to receive a satisfying answer.

1. Dating. How does any dating work? I understand that it uses radioactive decay and the equation is as follows:

D = D₀ + N(t) (e^λt − 1)

where t is age of the sample, D is number of atoms of the daughter isotope in the sample, D₀ is number of atoms of the daughter isotope in the original composition, N is number of atoms of the parent isotope in the sample at time t (the present), given by N(t) = N_oe^-λt, and λ is the decay constant of the parent isotope. But how can you possibly know D₀? If t is what we are trying to solve, λ can be found experimentally (although that can be debated), and everything else is measured at the time; but none of that explains D₀. It seems like one equation with two unknowns. How do they know there weren't contaminants? And how do they know this technique works past a certain point? If the dating cannot be verified, then the fossil record cannot be verified which is arguably the biggest evidence for evolution (at least in the macro sense).

2. Abiogenesis. I already alluded to this before, but as of right now, there is no credible theory to support abiogenesis. We have only observed life from life. The shear complexity of life seems to lean more to the intelligent design hypothesis.

3. The Meaning of Life. This is more metaphysical than scientific, but it's just hard for me to accept a fully naturalist explanation when humans are just so different compared to other creatures. We have music, art, architecture, and the appreciation for aesthetic value which has absolutely zero survival benefit. Certain axioms of mine seem predicated on the necessity of a human soul too which obviously cannot have occurred naturally.

These reasons compel me toward a creationist viewpoint despite the serious problems that creationism obviously has. I think the hardest aspect of creationism is that the explanations to get around dinosaurs, age of the Earth, and the like are very imaginative but are entirely based on the Bible. If you don't believe in the Bible, then there is no way you would be convinced of it. Truthfully, if it weren't for my metaphysical reason, I would have a hard time believing it myself. In the end, I just accept it as a mystery. 

Pregenesis

Can't really talk about before this though.

My interest in the concept of pregenesis or more specifically pre-Adam arose to the obvious problem that creationists have with explaining dinosaurs. I thought it would be interesting to talk about what people speculate what might have come before the events of Genesis or more specifically Adam.

Now I don't believe I can get earlier than than the text in the image to the left, but this is an objection raised by atheists to the uncaused cause or namely the concept of an eternal God. I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that our brains just cannot truly comprehend infinity. Calculus is a special branch of mathematics just to handle the concept of infinity. Regardless, my pregenesis discussion will begin with the second verse since we are given a description of the physical universe.

Before God declares, "Let there be light", the Earth already exists and is described as formless, empty, and covered in deep waters. This implies that the Earth has been around for some indefinite amount of time since the Bible refers to the first day after God declares light. What I find interesting about this point is that creationists and evolutionists bicker over the age of the Earth. Evolutionists argue that it is about a billion years old where as creationists will claim that it is merely a couple thousand. However, when you read just the first five verses of Genesis closely, you can see how biblically (obviously, evolutionists don't use the Bible as an argument) both interpretations could be correct.

With regards to dinosaurs mentioned earlier, some will claim that the "days" in Genesis may not be literal days especially since according to Genesis the sun, moon, and stars were created on the fourth day. It's admittedly a stretch and there are other explanations for dinosaurs that creationists use, but I don't feel it's important to get into them. For me personally, I just accept it as a mystery. It's possible that the "days" could be referring to an indefinite amount of time, but we are honestly only considering it because of our current understanding of Earth. It is worth mentioning that in other places in the Bible (particularly Daniel) many biblical scholars interpret days as meaning years. A hard cry away from billions of years, but it's worth mentioning that a totally literal reading of the Bible is unwise. The book is filled with symbolism.

I couldn't really find biblical proof to substantiate some of these claims, but some "theologians" use the loose interpretations of days to explain things like dinosaur, but more importantly they allude to the idea that the earth was empty to argue that this could imply protocivilizations. This may say a lot about me, but naturally, Atlantis comes up in these threads. Again, there is really no substantiation to these interpretations. It's more or less fan fiction used by some to attempt to reconcile the obvious contradictions between the claims in the Bible with scientific theories. If you truly believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, you must accept that some of it is symbolism and some of it is just a mystery. It is intellectually dishonest to claim otherwise.