Creation: Some Notes

Light offers the most intuitive argument for an extremely old universe, both by its fundamental speed limit, and what it reveals.

The speed of light can be observed directly, for example by the delays in exchanging signals with spacecraft and satellites. It is also tied to so many physical constants (in e = mc², c is the speed of light) that it is difficult to even imagine it changing. Parallax measurements taken from either side of the Earth's orbit of the sun show nearby stars appearing to move relative to distant stars, making stellar distances easy to calculate with simple trigonometry, so that we can say how long their light would take to reach us.

Young-Earth Creationism (YEC) typically claims that the universe is in the order of 10,000 years old. However, most stars are significantly further away than 10,000 light years. The nearest galaxy comparable to our own is Andromeda, more than two million light years away. When we look at that galaxy, we don't see it as it is now, but as it was when its stars released the light which has only now reached us. The question for YEC becomes: Did those stars exist two million ago?

There are two general responses offered to this question. The first invokes God's omnipotence. For a being to create all of space and time from nothing creates the reasonable expectation that any part of it could be subsequently recreated at will; with enough knwoledge and power, no physical task is even difficult. Hence, the stars could have been created along with their light, since their purpose was to give light to the earth. The second response invokes general relativity and big-bang cosmology, to argue that the expansion of the universe could have occurred in such a way that light crossed what were then smaller distances at a speed that was effectively much faster than light could now travel.

In the first case, sreating stars with their light already shining on the earth seems like a neat enough solution, except when we consider that light, by its nature, also shows us what the stars looked like, and what events occured to them at that time. Supernova 1987A, for example, showed the death of star that cataclysmically exploded 160,000 light years away (which is to say, 160,000 years ago). Did that star ever exist? If not, then why would God create light from it to shine upon the earth? Why would he make it look as if that star had existed, when it really had not?

This is an appearance of age argument. It says that God is deliberately making a young universe look old, which seems to imply not only dishonesty, but dishonesty for no apparent reason. If you're timeless and eternal as well as omnipotent -- as the act of creating time and space from nothing suggests -- then why not just create them in the (equally accessible) distant past?

In the second case, the argument from general relativity has only been made by Russell D. Humphreys in Starlight and Time. To understand the theory, and the critiques that have been offered of it, requires an understanding of some advanced physics, which will not be covered here. Although the view is presented in some popular YEC publications and websites as a credible theory, it has been critiqued in detail by seemingly all qualified reviewers, including Christian physicists (see links). It would be reasonable to discount the theory until it manages to find some more adherents amongst those who understand it.

Presently then, the universe can be agreed to be at least as old as cosmic distances imply. And the most distant stellar objects are presently thought to be at least 10 billion light years away.

What does this mean then? Does Genesis imply (or God thereby declare) that the earth is really so young as the YEC position suggests? Does the Anthropic Principle indicate that the universe shows a suggestive degree of physical fine-tuning? Does a large universe diminish human significance?

The following summary is largely from Harry L. Poe and Jimmy H. Davis' Science and Faith: An evangelical dialogue.

• John Ray (1628-1705, English Protestant) pioneers systematic classification; defines a species as a set of interbreeding organisms.
• Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778, Swiss Protestant) uses genus and species to label organisms; assigns 'kinds' to species, then genus and finally to orders. (Both Linnaeus and Ray write on natural theology.)
• Georges Leclerc (French naturalist in the revolutionary era) publishes Epochs de la Nature (1779), the first non-biblical account. Earth history is in seven epochs totalling 75,000 years; physical laws describe the formation of the solar system, and the origin and development of life on earth.
• Erasmus Darwin (1732-1801, grandfather of Charles), influenced by English concepts of progress and free enterprise; believes that an inner force drives organisms to higher forms by accumulating experience.
• Georges Cuvier (1769-1832, French Hugenot) adds phyla and families to taxonomy; applies them to study of fossils, becomes convinced of catastrophic extinctions, and that life is ancient.
• Jean Baptiste Lamarck in 1809 presents a theory of evolution through spontaneous generation and inheritance of aquired characteristics; he coined the term 'biology' and advocated an inner force improving species.
• Robert Jameson publishes a translation of Cuvier's Theory of the Earth in English; In the preface he proposes a 'Day-Age' theory: the 'days' in Genesis represent long periods of time.
• Rev. William Buckland (first professor of Geology at Oxford) responds in Relics of the Flood (1823) to Cuvier's catastrophism with a gap theory: millions of years elapse between creation and Genesis 1
• George Lyell (a student of Buckland's) publishes his three volume Principles of Geology: Being an Attempt to Explain the Former Changes in the Earth's Surface by Reference to Causes Now in Operation. He advances uniformitarianism against Cuvier's catastrophism.
• Charles Darwin in 1838 reads Thomas Malthus' Essay on the Principles of Population; populations increase faster than their food supply, creating survival pressures (famine, disease, war).
• Charles Darwin, between 1858 and 1871, publishes his own letters and those of Alfred Wallace as a parallel discovery in the Journal of the Linnean Society, then On the Origin of the Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life then The Descent of Man. Wallace does not agree with Descent that the human mind can be thereby explained.
• In the early 1900s there are still as many Lamarckian as Darwinian evolutionists; Work by Gregor Mendel (1822-84, Austrian monk) is rediscovered, allowing genetics to support the Darwinians.
• By 1945 neo-Darwinism has become the dominant model of life's development.
• Today, Darwinism is the dominant paradigm in the biological sciences.

The most interesting views on the subject appear to be:

Young-Earth Creationism (YEC)

The earth and the universe are 6-10,000 years old, Genesis 1-3 intends to give a literal and meaningfully scientific account of the process of creation. This group is the most politically active creationists, and sees creation as a consequence of inerrancy in scripture and a necessary foundation for theology. e.g. The Creation Science Foundation (CSF) and Answers in Genesis (AIG) are the best known YEC organisations.

'Long Ages' Creationism

The earth and the universe are billions of years old (or of biblically indeterminate age). Genesis does not describe comparatively recent events. The Anthropic Principle is sometimes invoked here. This view is most compatible with I.D.

Intelligent Design, or ID Theory

Living things show evidence of irreducible complexity meaning that they cannot have evolved by incremental changes. This is viewed by many Young Earth Creationists as compromising Biblical authority, and by many atheists as a plot by Young-Earth Creationists to give their views a superficial veneer of scientific respectability (the thin edge of the wedge, in education, they allege). Both charges are self-serving and largely irrelevant, in my humble opinion. William Dembski and Michael Behe are the best known ID advocates.

Other Critiques of Evolution

Some authors, sometimes with scientific credentials, find evolutionary theory to have serious conceptual, evidential or argumentative flaws, without necessarily arguing for a specific alternative, e.g. Michael Denton (molecular biologist) or Philip S. Johnson (lawyer).

Theistic Evolution, or Fully Gifted Creation

God created a world with the finely-tuned potential to bring forth life (but interventionist perspective, see Anthropic Principle again), or intervened as needed to direct the process of evolution (many from this camp find the idea of God 'propping up' creation to be repugnant). Howard J. Van Til is a leading author on the subject.

Two Books: Non-Overlapping Magisteria

Science and Theology explain different things in different ways, and cannot, even in principle, overlap or interfere with each other. Stephen Jay Gould has argued this from the scientific side; it is common in some liberal theologies.

Spiritual views of evolution

Evolution is just one special case of human development, including spiritual development. Teilhard de Chardin proposed a theory of Orthogenesis, whereby evolution occurs in a directed, goal-oriented way. Chardin influenced the Russian Orthodox geneticist and evolutionary biologist, Theodosius Dobzhansky.

Literary view of Genesis

Genesis 1-3 is a polemic against then prevalent creation stories such as the Enuma Elish; it's point is to explain monotheism in terms meaningful to ancient people. (This may be combined with other views here.)

Punctuated Evolution

Evolution occurs in jumps between long periods of stasis. e.g. Stephen Jay Gould. This seems to necessarily involve a disagreement about evolutionary mechanisms, when set against:

Gradualist Evolution

Evolution gradually works on all species through mutation and selection. e.g. Richard Dawkins. This is by far the leading form of contemporary Darwinism.