# If your a christian answer this
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [March 3, 2004, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277 "2004-03-03T08:53:29Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Faucet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Faucet)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/1 "2004-03-03T08:53:29Z")
If your an atheist then this question really isn’t for you because I’m assuming that God created the universe. The question is do you think God used evolution to create the universe or did he create it in 6 days?
I personally tend to believe 6 days because we are talking about God here not some 20 man construction crew.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/2 "2004-03-03T09:04:04Z")
If God created the universe complete (i.e. in the same general state we now observe it) in six days, then he has gone to considerable lengths to cover his tracks and make it look like he _didn’t_ create it in six days.
What is your basis for believing it was 6 days?
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### Author:  [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/3 "2004-03-03T11:10:00Z")
It should first be noted that I do not know anyone who belives that the universe is the result of evolution. Evolution (used as a generalized term) refers to the specific development of species of animals _after_ life has arisen. The beginning of life is separate from the development of living things through the process of evolution.
That said, I note that there is ample evidence in the bible that God wants us to use our senses and our minds to study the world around us and that all the evidence that we have points to naturalistic processes operating at every level of cosmological development.
Even if the Big Bang later turns out to be a mistaken description of the physical universe, all the evidence currently indicates that the universe is a constantly expanding bubble of matter. Geology indicates that the Earth is 4+ billion years old and all the evidence in rock suggests that the actions of natural phenomena such as plate tectonics, erosion, and sedimentation best describe the processes that have produced the world we see. Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection (modified by the newer information regarding genetics into “neo-Darwinism”) does the best job of describing how and why we have the myriad species of living critters that we see on the Earth (along with describing why we have fossils of different critters buried in the Earth). In addition, at the edges of their respective domains, cosmology and geology provide explanations that mutually reinforce each discipline and geology and paleontology provide explanations that mutually reinforce each other, providing a continuum of interconnected explanations without contradictions.
I certainly believe that God created the universe, but I note that Genesis 1 is a poetic expression that God applied order to the universe and Genesis 2 is a prose description of the reason that God created humanity and that both of those chapters in Genesis contradict each other and are contradicted by the physical evidence. This leads me to conclude that the stories in Genesis are intended for _moral_ instruction rather than scientific explanation and that for a physical description of _how_ God’s creation has unfolded I should look to the evidence dscribed by and commented upon in science.
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### Author:  [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/4 "2004-03-03T11:18:11Z")
> [@](#):
>
> species of animals pi]after\* life has arisen
s/b “species of living things _after_ life has arisen”
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### Author:  [@BarnOwl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BarnOwl)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/5 "2004-03-03T11:19:10Z")
How many times are we going to do this question?
I believe God used evolution. The “six days” were for the benefit of the folks way back when who had no conception of the Big Bang, etc. So the Torah/OT was couched in terms they could grasp.
In one of my old, old Zoology textx, the author said something to the effect that there’s more evidence to support evolution than there is that the sun will come up again tomorrow. Somewhere in there he also added that although evolution is - and probably always will be - a theory, scientists who deal with evolution regard it as fact.
I agree with him.
I taught Biology at an all-girls’ Catholic Junir Hight-High School. The only restriction I got from the Mother Superior was to present it as a theory.
So, I kinda sorta did. Well, not at all, in fact.
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### Author:  [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/6 "2004-03-03T12:43:17Z")
> [@Faucet](#):
>
> If your an atheist then this question really isn’t for you because I’m assuming that God created the universe. The question is do you think God used evolution to create the universe or did he create it in 6 days?
> I personally tend to believe 6 days because we are talking about God here not some 20 man construction crew.
You are, of course, not basing this conclusion on a mere translation but upon full idiomatic understanding of the earliest texts, right?
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### Author:  [@Genghis\_Bob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Genghis_Bob)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/7 "2004-03-03T12:53:03Z")
I don’t think it’s possible to sum it up any better than \*\*tomndebb \*\* did.
When I was a little kid, even my obedient non-questioning Catholic mom (raised pre-Vatican II) taught that Genesis is not a literal depiction of cosmology. She told me and my sisters “yes, God created the Universe in six days. Six \*\*God \*\* days. Who knows how long one of God’s days is?” That sufficed for a child’s understanding.
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### Author:  [@sghoul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sghoul)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/8 "2004-03-03T14:39:07Z")
Either:
1. God created the earth in 6 days (which I do not belive). In which case, like some books have surmised (such as a Book by Terry Pratchett, in which the universe is only 10,000 years old. The creators mearly wanted it to look like it was billions of years.) God placed false clues (carbon dating, fossils, science in general) to lead us the wrong way.
Or
1. God created science, set things in motion, and things developed. I once had it put to me like this, for the literalists. One day to God is as a thousand years to man (in the Bible somewhere, I am horible at quotes). I was then explained that 1000 to ancient Hebrews actually meant “A really huge number”.
Think about it, you are ancient man. God is laying out how he made the universe (only he doesn’t put it to you like that because the concept of something so big would make your head explode), he’s about to say “It to Me billions of years”, but stops, realizing that no one for quite some time would even understand 1 million, let alone billions.
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### Author:  [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/9 "2004-03-03T14:51:36Z")
God definitely created the universe in 6 days
… but I dont know what kind of “”“days”"" they were, since there was no earth, and therefore no “earth day” .
Of course our universe looks older!!! (silly) what would you expect?
If you create a mountain, the minute after you create it the mountain will look millions of years old. If you create a solar system, it will look(appear to be) billions of years old.
If you make a man, he will look 30 years old one second after he(Adam) was created. It is impossible to create an adult man who looks only a second old. When Eve was created, she also appeared to be an adult woman a single second after she was made.
Just how can anyone possilby think a planet or a person could be created and look one single second old is beyond me.
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### Author:  [@Genghis\_Bob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Genghis_Bob)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/10 "2004-03-03T15:11:11Z")
> [@Susanann](#):
>
> . . . Of course our universe looks older!!! (silly) what would you expect? . . .
Actually, I would expect it to look pretty much as old as it actually is. I can think of no reason, and I find nothing in scripture to indicate, that God intended to “fool” us about the age of the universe.
A mountain that has just been created (say, by tectonic action) would most likely have jagged edges. After aeons of weathering, it would look - well, “weathered”. A person who has just been created is very small, kind of slimy, and usually squalling like a baby.
All the evidence we can gather indicates that creation is a slow, natural and on-going process. Scripture tells us that it is intended to be so - that is, existence is not accidental. But scripture does not even attempt to tell us **how** these things were accomplished in any level of detail. The mechanics of things are not in the domain of Scripture.
Since I have no evidence that God intentionally lies to us, and I do have evidence that creation happened over the course of Billions of years, then I conclude that God’s act of creation did happen over billions of years, using the natural processes that he instituted. Accepting the findings of science should not constitute a challenge to Faith, or to the ultimate Trush of Scripture.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/11 "2004-03-03T15:13:07Z")
The ‘appearance of maturity’ argument doesn’t do much for me; sure, an instantly-created mountain might _look_ old superficially, but do the rocks of which it is composed contain fossils of animals whose lives were a complete fiction?
When Adam was created as a fully-mature 30-year-old (not sure where the figure of 30 comes from, but it is common), was he created with fake memories of human parents? Ersatz scars on his knees from where he would have fallen out of a tree at age 12?
There are some things (apple trees, for example) that would _need_ to be mature to be functional, but a universe that contains light from supernovae that never really existed, let alone exploded - it just smacks of fraud and fakery on a grand scale
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/12 "2004-03-03T15:20:00Z")
**Susanann:** \*If you create a mountain, the minute after you create it the mountain will look millions of years old. If you create a solar system, it will look(appear to be) billions of years old.
If you make a man, he will look 30 years old one second after he(Adam) was created. […]
Just how can anyone possilby think a planet or a person could be created and look one single second old is beyond me.\*
That’s an initially startling but actually pretty cool explanation, it seems to me. It means that you’re assuming that the natural aging process for the earth, solar system, etc. **is** exactly as scientists have described it: e.g., planetary nebulae will condense into planets, early life forms will leave imprints in sand that will then turn into fossils, etc.
In other words, God created mountains with overthrust rock layers and fossils and so forth for the same reason that he created Adam with a full set of teeth, developed secondary sex characteristics, and so forth: namely, because that’s what the critter would look like if it had developed **naturally** from a **material** origin to that particular point.
Meaning that you totally **agree** with cosmologists and geologists and biologists about how the process of natural development from a material origin works in the physical universe as we know it. You just believe that God, instead of starting the development process from the beginning, called it into being _in medias res_ somewhere along the line, complete with all the proper traces of past development in the observable evidence.
I think that’s actually a very elegant and harmonious way of reconciling creationist beliefs with science. Creationists get to have their belief in supernatural divine creation, scientists get to have their materialist, non-supernatural explanations of physical processes, and everybody’s happy.
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### Author:  [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/13 "2004-03-03T15:25:01Z")
I personally know that the world is only half-real anyway, so the question itself is moot. It is, after all, hardly more than a thought, a perception of reality, which will have no true life until the end of days, “after” time itself falls away.
Matter is not a delusion - it’s simply an accomodation. Similarly, this life we have is truthfully the sum total of our own choices.
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### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/14 "2004-03-03T15:30:21Z")
> [@Faucet](#):
>
> The question is do you think God used evolution to create the universe or did he create it in 6 days?
> I personally tend to believe 6 days because we are talking about God here not some 20 man construction crew.
Well, evolution is a biological process, so no, I don’t beleive He used evolution to “create the universe.” I _do_ beleive that evolution is the most likely explanation for the diversity of life we see on earth.
I believe God created the universe out of nothing, but not fully formed in its present state in six earth days. I think he created the universe slowly, over billions of years, using ‘natural’ processes (which, of course, he created in the first place).
So my short answer to your question: neither.
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### Author:  [@Genghis\_Bob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Genghis_Bob)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/15 "2004-03-03T15:34:10Z")
> [@Kimstu](#):
>
> I think that’s actually a very elegant and harmonious way of reconciling creationist beliefs with science. Creationists get to have their belief in supernatural divine creation, scientists get to have their materialist, non-supernatural explanations of physical processes, and everybody’s happy.
It’s elegant and harmonious, yes, but is it necessary? Isn’t it much simpler to believe in supernatural divine creation through materialist physical processes? At least then, all scientists won’t be required to fall into the “non-supernatural” camp, as your formulation seems to force to.
It just seems to be a very labored logical construction intended to keep everybody “happy”, when the truth is most likely something much simpler and truly elegant.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/16 "2004-03-03T16:44:39Z")
Other problems for creationists wanting to use the ‘appearance of age argument’:
-Where’s the flood stratum?
-It is contradictory to all these claims of evidence for a young Earth.
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### Author:  [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/17 "2004-03-03T16:52:22Z")
**rsgd:** \*It’s elegant and harmonious, yes, but is it necessary? \*
Well, **something** is obviously necessary in order to reconcile modern “Biblical literalist” beliefs in divine creation with the theories of modern science. At present, neither side is having much luck convincing the other that it’s flat-out wrong, nor are we managing simply to agree to disagree and leave each other alone. If we can get around this problem and achieve genuine reconciliation by introducing an elegant metaphysical waffle, in the best and highest sense of the term, then I’m all for it.
_Isn’t it much simpler to believe in supernatural divine creation through materialist physical processes?_
Sure, but not everybody does. It’s even simpler to believe in materialist physical processes without bringing supernatural divine creation into it at all, for that matter. Simplicity is no guarantee of success when it comes to belief systems.
_At least then, all scientists won’t be required to fall into the “non-supernatural” camp, as your formulation seems to force to._
Actually, I don’t think it does. As the methodology of science currently works, scientists can personally believe anything they want to about supernatural events or beings, as long as they restrict **scientific theories** to dealing solely with material explanations of observed phenomena. **Susanann** ’s “elegant waffle” doesn’t change anything in that accomodation.
_It just seems to be a very labored logical construction intended to keep everybody “happy”, when the truth is most likely something much simpler and truly elegant._
Mmmph, I think that making predictions about the aesthetic nature of “the truth” is unnecessary, and probably metaphysically biased. I think it’s fine if scientists choose to assume that the ultimate reality of nature is elegant and simple, as a methodological guideline for doing science (e.g., that’s the implied justification for Occam’s Razor). However, I see no need to make the same assumption for religious or transcendent or supernatural truth as well.
Personally, I have no idea whether God (if there were a God) would prefer to have the universe ultimately as simple and transparent as possible, or would rather gussy it up some with unnecessary complexity and evidentiary dead-ends and illusions. (Personally, if I were God and I preferred the former alternative, I would have tried to make more of the universal constants come out to be integers, but maybe that’s just me. 🙂 )
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### Author:  [@Renob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renob)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/18 "2004-03-03T16:55:09Z")
As a former fundamentalist/curent theological conservative, I have a few thoughts here:
One, God is God and we can’t really say how He’d do anything. I always chuckle when people say “God would have had to do it this way” or “God couldn’t have done it this way.” If you do believe in God, then you can’t limit Him. He’ll do what He wants. If He wanted to create the world as it exists in the space of a day, He certainly could do that.
Two, I’m skeptical of relying on modern science for an authoritative explanation. Sure, the science we have today certainly points towards the falsity of a literal six-day creation, but who’s to say what science will say in 100 years. Look back at everything that was scientifically “true” 100 years ago. A lot of it has been proven wrong. I also doubt science can even come to a firm conclusion about this matter. We can never know with certainty how the world began.
Three, this is really an unimportant question. If the world really were created over the course of a million years or whatever, I don’t see how this should affect anyone’s faith. I don’t believe in God because He is a fast builder. My faith doesn’t hinge on a literal six-day creation. I believe the Bible is authoritative in matters of faith and how to live one’s life. Everything else is unimportant.
So do I believe in a literal six day creation? No, probably not. I’m really agnostic about it because I simply don’t care. It’s one of those unimportant debates that takes us away from focusing on the important stuff in the Bible. Furthermore, it’s a debate that can’t be resolved one way or another, so why worry about trying to figure out something that will never be figured out?
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/19 "2004-03-03T17:08:17Z")
> [@Renob](#):
>
> Two, I’m skeptical of relying on modern science for an authoritative explanation. Sure, the science we have today certainly points towards the falsity of a literal six-day creation, but who’s to say what science will say in 100 years. Look back at everything that was scientifically “true” 100 years ago. A lot of it has been proven wrong. I also doubt science can even come to a firm conclusion about this matter. We can never know with certainty how the world began.
I think this rather underestimates the process by which current scientific understanding came about; 100 years ago (or more, probably), what was considered ‘true’ was not ascertained by objective, self-correcting processes; of course nobody can predict the future, but current understanding of the nature of things is based on such a weight of inter-related observation and data, that the kind of discovery needed to overturn it would be like discovering that there were elephants living in your bedroom that you just never happened to notice before.
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### Author:  [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2004, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-your-a-christian-answer-this/232277/20 "2004-03-03T17:43:21Z")
> [@smiling bandit](#):
>
> I personally know that the world is only half-real anyway, so the question itself is moot. It is, after all, hardly more than a thought, a perception of reality, which will have no true life until the end of days, “after” time itself falls away…
I felt _exactly_ the same way after polishing off _my_ bottle of slivovitz last night!
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