Interested in Proof of Macroevolution

[Voyager]

Since it’s either this or start on my taxes, I’ll try to correct some of your major misunderstandings. Talk Origins is as always, the goto place for this stuff.

@timtupp

Good point. By macroevolution, I am essentially referring to the development of large sets of characteristics, not simply to speciation. For example, I would see dogs, cats, horses, etc. as distinct groups which would require macroevolution to produce. Variations in fruit-flies, finches, and cave-dwelling fish would fall into the category I would describe as microevolution.

Do you think macroevolution assumes that a cat turns into a dog? Why do you think that small changes, accumulating over millions of years, can’t account for the big changes. Consider the great differences between dog varieties. We know they all came from a common ancestor, and are one species, with this tremendous change happening over only a few tens of thousands of years. It was so fast because we helped push it along, but not by using any techniques that nature doesn’t use already.

Question:
Is evolution consistent [or not] with Biblical creation?
<snip>
Genesis asserts three things were created by God from nothing:
[1] The physical universe: matter.
[2] Life.
[3] Man [in the image of God; energized by the spirit [breath] of God].

Apart from these, other things [both inert and living] were made

Examine scientific knowledge on these three points.

1(a) Big Bang - Time Zero.
1(b) God created the heaven and the earth.

As we trace the physical evolution of the universe backwards, we are stopped at a cosmic age of about 10-47 seconds. Previous to that, the temperature and density of the universe are so great all our theories and equations break down. Our first picture of the universe is a perfectly symmetrical, 10-dimensional space-time. The four known forces: gravitational, electromagnetic, strong and weak nuclear were unified by the super-string. Ten dimensions soon became four, as six of them collapsed. the universe was an opaque ionic soup for about 300,000 years. Then matter condensed into atoms and molecules. Stars and galaxies formed, and things became something resemblant to what we see today.

Genesis says In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
Science knows nothing before 10-47 seconds.
We have no theory - descriptive or causal - for the beginning.

There is no inconsistency between two points of view, one of which does not exist.

Except that God create the heavens and the earth about 10 billion years apart. Why would that be? And, as mentioned, evolution has absolutely nothing to do with the creation of earth or the universe. It is usually said that it has nothing to do with abiogenesis either, but if life began from the evolution of self-replicating molecules, you might say it did.

2(a) Life itself evolved from primordial soup
2(b) God created … living creatures

There is an understandable difference between an elephant gun and an elephant. The elephant possesses something the gun does not - although in the hands of a marksman the gun can remove that difference - namely life. Darwin taught that living beings could defy the 2nd law of thermodynamics - that disorder must follow order - through the process of natural selection.

No he did not, and I’m afraid that this shows you don’t understand the second law. Do you think the growth of a flower from a seed violates the second law? The flower is far more organized. There is no physical law against the increase of complexity. If you draw a circle around anything, you will find that the energy in exceeds the energy out. For the earth, the sun provides plenty of energy to cover any growth or increase in complexity. Talk origins has an excellent section on this, I recommend that you look at it.

But Darwin does not describe the origin of the amoeba.

To get the amoeba, we need something called primordial soup. And a bolt of lightning. Or maybe cosmic radiation. Something. Anything. In the laboratory, elemental carbon has been coaxed into hydrocarbon rings - the building blocks of life. But so far, that’s it.

An amoeba is quite a complex creature, and the ones we see have evolved for a billion years. You are sadly mistaken if you think abiogenesis says that amoebas pop out of the soup. Consider how much simpler viruses are than amoebas - so simple they’re kind of on the borderline of living and non-living. We’re just about ready to create artificial viruses. So much for the spark of life.

Genesis says God created life itself.
Science has made a hydrocarbon but not made something living from something inert.

Keep your eye on the news. This statement won’t be correct a year or two from now.

For the secularist who has gotten past the origin of matter and the origin of life, it’s the simplest of processes to get to homo sapiens. Time plus chance. Oodles of time to be sure, and the most favorable of chances. But the chances don’t have to be so terribly favorable, if they’re provided with say trillions of years to play out.

Your mistake here is the assumption that we’re the desired end result. What are the chances of dealing one particular bridge hand? Astronomically small, of course. But you’ll always get a hand. The chances of human beings showing up are small, but no smaller than the chance of any other intelligent species. We don’t know what the chance of intelligence developing is, of course. If the asteroid hadn’t hit, there might be intelligent dinosaurs speculating on how their existence was inevitable.

Here the comparison of two views is the most subjective. On the one hand, neither point of view sports compelling evidence: creationists have two or three verses in Genesis to support their belief; science has no experimental evidence to dispute it.

Wrongo. We have plenty of evidence about the order in which the “kinds” evolved, all of it contradicting Genesis. Genesis says that the moon creates light like the sun - wrong. Do you think women came from a man’s rib? Which of the two versions of the creation story do you accept anyhow - the one where Adam and Eve came before the animals or after?

I cannot grasp the idea of life. As a schoolboy I saw a dog run into the street and be struck dead by a car. I looked long as his lifeless body, unable to understand how, only a moment before, he was a healthy animal, no doubt loved by a human family. Now he was motionless. Same appearance, same color, same molecules. Still warm. But fundamentally and forever changed. I still marvel at life. Primordial soup and lightning bolts don’t do it for me.

Had to respond to this one. At one moment your computer is working, your disk is spinning. Poof goes the power supply, and the next moment it’s dead. How is this fundamentally different from a dog, or from us? We’re complex creatures, and when parts break the whole breaks.

As for the Big Bang. It looks compellingly probable. If there’s eternity [double-ended infinity of time] and a pre-existent God, then what or who was there, before the Big Bang? Scientifically, it seems certain that we can’t go back beyond that 10-47 seconds of time. And probably there is nothing like what we experience as time that precedes the Big Bang. If that’s true, then time is single ended - everlasting - but having the BB as a starting point.

Which leaves me with the amazing notion – that if God is eternal [doubly ended infinite time] and the Big Bang was but a single creative word uttered by God, then God is awesome beyond comprehension.

If you want to believe that God started off the Big Bang and got out of the way, there is nothing that will contradict you. However, you should consider why an all-knowing god would get the story in Genesis so wrong. Maybe some God who has never come near us created the universe and gave a race of aliens who are his real people the true story. (And probably didn’t wait around 13 billion years to make them.) Maybe we’re the accidental byproducts of the universe created for them. It makes a lot more sense than a god who lied to us about the origin of things.

[Musicat]

@timtupp

An attack on the biblical account will not be useful here. My belief does not arise from my innate desire to blindly accept myths. I believe, for a great number of reasons that the Bible is inspired by God. It thus follows that I would view the Genesis account as having authority, and that I would be interested in determining how the specific creation described in the Bible meshes with what has been observed.

Are you also interested in what doesn’t mesh with what has been observed? Will you consider evidence both for and against what the bible says?

Before you get too far into this field, it would be helpful for you to learn just exactly what evolution claims, not what fundamentalists wrongly think it claims. For example, I often hear “nothing that complex could just happen by random, unguided chance!” as an argument against evolution. But evolution makes no such claim. Once you understand what science is, not what someone thinks it is, then we will be making progress towards overcoming ignorance.

If you then insist that you must reconcile the bible with science, go ahead and try. Dr. Harry Rimmer did. But if you find a difference, ask yourself if God intended you to use that brain of yours or not.

[John_Mace]

You know, we get a lot of “guests” coming in here asking about evolution, and some of them turn out to be fundamentalists trolls. So far, the OP has been pretty upfront and honest. I don’t think adopting and adversarial tone is going to help in the fight against ignorance here. There is so much misinformation out there about evolution, and he’s not really saying anything that even some of my supposedly educated friends might say.

I would add, directed at the OP, that if you want to understand evolution, you’ve come to a good place. But if you want to somehow reconcile your Biblical beliefs with science, then that isn’t going to happen here. Keep your faith if you find it helps you, but faith and science just don’t intersect.

[MEBuckner]

@timtupp

Good point. By macroevolution, I am essentially referring to the development of large sets of characteristics, not simply to speciation. For example, I would see dogs, cats, horses, etc. as distinct groups which would require macroevolution to produce. Variations in fruit-flies, finches, and cave-dwelling fish would fall into the category I would describe as microevolution.

I’m curious; what do you include in the category or “kind” you are referring to as “cats”? I assume you mean your basic domestic or house cat; but also the very closely related ancestral wild cat. (Which nowadays domestic cats are generally classed as a subspecies of rather than a separate species.) Various other small to medium-sized predators (servals and caracals and ocelots and lynxes and so on) are clearly also “cats”. Then there are the pumas, which still (to me) are unmistakeably “cats”, but we’re talking now about cats as big as a person, which could eat you, given the chance. Finally, there are the animals that as far as I know almost everyone (even creationists) calls “big cats”: lions, tigers, leopards, jaguars. The resemblance to Fluffy the housecat still seems very clear, in terms of both appearance and behavior, but now we’re talking about animals that weigh up to 500 pounds and are clearly capable of treating humans as lunch.

So, on the one hand, one could argue that there is really isn’t any familial relationship between cats and ocelots and pumas and leopards–wherever one draws the line. But most people seem to intuitively reject that; we recognize the truth of the scientific classification of all of them as part of a “family” (Felidae). Or one could argue that Fluffy and a 500-pound Siberian tiger are nonetheless part of the same “kind”. But if there is some process that can derive a tiger and Fluffy the housecat from a common ancestor, where is the line that says that far, but no further? Why can’t there be another ancestor, even further back, which gave rise to cats and dogs? (By “dogs” I mean dogs and wolves and coyotes and jackals, and also dholes, and even foxes.) Sure, cats and dogs are pretty distinct; but they also have many common features; we’re talking about furry quadrupeds with sharp teeth. The cat family and the dog family and the bear family and the weasel family are all members of the Order Carnivora–each family derives from some ancient common ancestor, and those common ancestors of the cats and dogs and bears and weasels and so on in turn were all descendants from some even more ancient Ur-Carnivoran. (Of course the actual family tree of Order Carnivora is more complicated than that.) Where precisely in all this do we cross that ne plus ultra line between “microevolution” and “macroevolution”?

[timtupp]

Thank you all for your comments. I must admit it’s a lot to try and assimilate at once, and there’s simply way too much here to respond to everything. Let me start with a comment on the Genesis account.

In attempting to poke holes in the creation account, there are a lot of assumptions about the meaning of various terms. Consider it from this angle (which is how it was described to me):

The creation account was likely provided by God in the form of a vision either to Moses (the writer) or to someone before him, and passed down through generations. The events unfold as though from the standpoint of an observer on earth. This is evident from the description of the Sun and Moon as greater luminaries on the 4th day. The term “in the beginning” (Ge 1:1) indicates a time preceding the six creative days. In other words, the “heavens” (including the physical universe, such as the Sun, Moon, and stars) and the “Earth” were in existence prior to the creative days, which simply describe the forming of the Earth’s surface relevant to man’s arrival. It kind of makes sense to me that each “day” is rather like the presentation of a phase of the process that begins and ends with a camera fade-in/fade-out.

Day 1: Let light come to be. Light reaches the Earth’s surface. Perhaps dense gases in the atmosphere prior to this time kept the surface in relative darkness.

Day 2: Let an expanse (firmament) come between the waters. Later the birds are described as flying in this expanse, so it would follow that this is a description of water being lifted into the atmosphere. If this were to provide complete cloud cover for the planet, it would explain day 4.

Day 3: Dry land appears. Vegetation and trees appear. It doesn’t seem impossible to me that plants could have appeared on land prior to the advent of water-animals, but if there was evidence to the contrary, that’s not a sticking point. Again, this is just a general presentation of the order of events presented to a primitive people.

Day 4: Luminaries (a greater and a lesser, obviously the Sun and Moon) come to be in the expanse. In time the vegetation would have altered the atmosphere, increasing the ratio of oxygen to carbon dioxide, thus better supporting animal life. The result might have been a clearing of the cloud canopy, thus allowing the Sun, Moon, and stars to be clearly visible.

Day 5: Larger swimming and flying creatures appear. Of course, birds flying over the earth would have likely required some animal life to already be on the land (unless they were strictly herbivores, which seems unlikely), but not the presence of the larger, more visible animals described next.

Day 6: Wild and domestic land animals appear. Man is created.

I think it’s safe to say that the Bible (regardless of whether authored by men or God) is intended as a guidebook, not a scientific reference. However, if it is from God, one would expect the details, no matter how simplistic, to be accurate. At the same time it would not benefit humans to be provided with technical details they were not equipped to understand. Now, since I obviously don’t take the account at a tight, word-for-word, literal interpretation, you could reason “How does the theory of evolution and common origin conflict with this account?”

Two points:

1. The evolutionary process, by definition, does not require outside intervention. The Bible, however, credits God with distinct acts of creation. This is reconciled by pointing out that the times where God “made” things from previous material does not require ex nihilo creation, thus supposedly not conflicting with evolution. However, if God is stepping in to direct the process, then that still strikes at the core of the what evolution is all about.

2. Even if I concluded that the evidence was, in fact, overwhelming in support of macroevolution for animals, this still does not fit with the account of Adam and Eve with regard to human origin. According to the Bible, there is a clear distinction between animals and humans, the latter being created “in God’s image” and appointed as dominant over the rest of creation on Earth (Ge 1:27,28). Humans were designed to live forever, and death was the punishment for sin. Much of the rest of the Bible deals with the need for redemption from sin and death, and how this was accomplished by the death of the Messiah. According to Ro 5:12, “through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men because they had all sinned.” This simply doesn’t jive with the idea that Adam and Eve were actually just two lucky/unlucky souls selected from among an entire population of homo-sapiens to start the human race.

I still want to reply to some other posts, but I’ll have to do that another time. I can see from the rather large outpouring of response, however, that this is a topic many here feel strongly about. I obviously picked a good place to post the question.

[Mosier]

I can’t contribute much, except to point out that science typically has an easier time disproving stuff than proving it. Science has disproven lots of stuff from the Genesis account of the beginning of the universe, but it hasn’t disproven or even legitimately tried to disprove the existence of God or the divinity of Jesus or that Muhammed was the greatest prophet. Science doesn’t address that stuff at all, so as long as your faith isn’t based on a literal and perfectly accurate holy book, you’re fine.

[Musicat]

@timtupp

The creation account was likely provided by God…

That’s a BIG assumption. And that’s assuming what we are trying to prove. Wrong sequence.

Much more likely is legends were passed by oral history, then put down by an early scribe. The Genesis theory is consistent with (and probably derived from) other legends and folk tales.

It kind of makes sense to me that each “day” is rather like the presentation of a phase of the process that begins and ends with a camera fade-in/fade-out.

The interpretation of “day” is a vital point. The Hebrew word “yom” appears in the bible 1480 times, and is translated 54 different ways in one version, yet I doubt that the ancients considered the biblical day as anything other than 24 hours. It was only in more modern times, when the age of the earth was discovered to be millions or billions of years that the translation of “yom” was stretched to encompass “eons”.

If a day was an eon, you have a serious problem with a half-eon of dark for plants. Then you have to account for just how it was dark, then light for so long, then how days suddenly became 24 hours long. Did the earth stop rotating, then pick up speed all of a sudden?

When you begin to ponder such things, you begin to realize just how little the ancients knew about astonomy, physics, botany and most other sciences. The Genesis account makes complete sense only in light of their limited knowledge, and absolutely no sense with today’s. In order to reconcile the biblical account, you have to discard parts, bend others, and make fantastical guesses. Ever heard of Occam’s Razor?

.Day 1: Let light come to be. Light reaches the Earth’s surface. Perhaps dense gases in the atmosphere prior to this time kept the surface in relative darkness.

Perhaps. But is there any evidence? You are forced to postulate one unlikely event to explain another unlikely event. The more layers of guessing we have, the more preposterous things become.

Day 4: Luminaries (a greater and a lesser, obviously the Sun and Moon) come to be in the expanse. In time the vegetation would have altered the atmosphere, increasing the ratio of oxygen to carbon dioxide, thus better supporting animal life. The result might have been a clearing of the cloud canopy, thus allowing the Sun, Moon, and stars to be clearly visible.

So, if you are taking a day to be an eon, how did plants and animals exist without the sun? For that matter, how did this planet avoid becoming a sub-zero iceball without external heat? It gets pretty cold in some places on earth during winter nowadays. Can you imagine how cold it would be if no sun appeared for a million years?

Day 5: Larger swimming and flying creatures appear. Of course, birds flying over the earth would have likely required some animal life to already be on the land (unless they were strictly herbivores, which seems unlikely), but not the presence of the larger, more visible animals described next.

You are piling supposition upon supposition, all to explain an ignorant folk tale.

I think it’s safe to say that the Bible (regardless of whether authored by men or God) is intended as a guidebook, not a scientific reference. However, if it is from God, one would expect the details, no matter how simplistic, to be accurate.

Good point. Since they don’t appear to be, doesn’t that cast serious doubt on those writings?

At the same time it would not benefit humans to be provided with technical details they were not equipped to understand.

But if a mention of dinosaurs were included in sacred writings, and later, dinosaur bones were found, wouldn’t that be stronger proof that the bible isn’t just an ancient legend? Why didn’t God tell us about DNA? Galaxies? Electricity? Calculus? Rocket science?

According to the Bible, there is a clear distinction between animals and humans…

Another folk tale. Modern genetics has shown that there is very little difference between humans and our closest relatives (99% similarity with chimpanzees, 97% with mice [the exact numbers vary according to the source]). As to a soul, that is entirely a religious concept. If humans have one or chimps don’t is something science cannot answer.

I can see from the rather large outpouring of response, however, that this is a topic many here feel strongly about. I obviously picked a good place to post the question.

Yes, you did, as long as you are serious about learning the truth, and not following blindly from your interpretation of the bible or your religious upbringing. It’s refreshing to have these kind of people here, and they are welcome.

So how you coming with your reading of talkorigins? You might want to check out books on evolution by Richard Dawkins as well if you prefer the printed word.

[tomndebb]

@timtupp

The Old Testament creation account sounds suspiciously like the sort of rubbish ignorant primitives would come up with to explain the cosmos. None of it jibes with scientific investigation and evidence. You’re already willing to ignore the “days” mentioned in Genesis, yet you hold on to god creating the animals whole?

An attack on the biblical account will not be useful here. My belief does not arise from my innate desire to blindly accept myths. I believe, for a great number of reasons that the Bible is inspired by God. It thus follows that I would view the Genesis account as having authority, and that I would be interested in determining how the specific creation described in the Bible meshes with what has been observed.

I suspect that your first sentence is exactly true, but that your last sentence (and the rest of your post) will carry this into a hijack that will prevent this thread from achieving your objective. A declaration that myth is the sort of “rubbish ignorant primitives” would write to “explain the cosmos” indicates an ignorance of the anthropological meaning and uses of myth as profound as the ignorance displayed by some Creationists when they (erroneously) talk about evolution being “random.”

Rather than trying to reconcile Genesis 1:1 through 2:2 to science, I would suggest limiting this thread to the differences between (and definitions of) micro- and macro-evolution (with examples) and leave the discussion of Genesis to a separate thread.

[interface2x]

@timtupp

The creation account was likely provided by God in the form of a vision either to Moses (the writer) or to someone before him, and passed down through generations.

But what of the two versions of creation in Genesis? Which one is right?

[John_Mace]

@Musicat

That’s a BIG assumption. And that’s assuming what we are trying to prove. Wrong sequence.

Yes, that is the crux of the matter right there. If we start off assuming the essential truth of the creation account in the Bible, then the debate is over. It’s a mistake to try and reconcile Genesis with science. Evolution stands or falls on its own, and you cannot hamstring science by forcing it to fit into some preconceived religious framework. If the OP wants to understand evolution, he needs to simply look at the evidence. If he wants to maintain his faith in Christianity, that is another issue altogether.

[Stranger_On_A_Train]

@interface2x

But what of the two versions of creation in Genesis? Which one is right?

Commoner: No one will hear you, no matter how loud you shout. Just think. Which one of these stories do you believe?
Woodcutter: None makes any sense.
Commoner: Don’t worry about it. It isn’t as if men were reasonable.– Rashomon

Stranger

[Musicat]

With respect to the OP, there is copius evidence to macroevolution. What do you think the fossil record is? How about DNA analysis? Both show a gradual change in organisms. Accumulate gradual changes (micro-) and you get large changes (macro-).

The only reason we separate species is that the changes between groups have become so great that groups cannot (or do not) interbreed. This can occur thru time or geography.

In case you are claiming gaps in the fossil record, the gaps of 100 years ago have mostly been filled in, and more are being filled in all the time. Transitional fossils have now been found exactly where we expect in the evolutionary tree.

Just remember, if you have one “gap” between two groups and you find a fossil with characteristics of both, you now have created two “gaps” where there once was one, but each gap represents a smaller difference.

[nameless]

@Stranger On A Train

Commoner: No one will hear you, no matter how loud you shout. Just think. Which one of these stories do you believe?
Woodcutter: None makes any sense.
Commoner: Don’t worry about it. It isn’t as if men were reasonable.– Rashomon

Stranger

God I love that movie.

[Mangetout]

@timtupp

I think it’s safe to say that the Bible (regardless of whether authored by men or God) is intended as a guidebook, not a scientific reference. However, if it is from God, one would expect the details, no matter how simplistic, to be accurate. At the same time it would not benefit humans to be provided with technical details they were not equipped to understand. Now, since I obviously don’t take the account at a tight, word-for-word, literal interpretation, you could reason “How does the theory of evolution and common origin conflict with this account?”

The fossil and geological records are irreconcilable with the day-sequence creation account in Genesis - regardless of the lengths of the days - the sequence of described events just isn’t the same, however thick you slice it.

[sqweels]

@timtupp

Gen 1:7. God made the firmament …
Gen 1:16. God made two great lights …
Gen 1:16. … he made the stars also.

The Moon is not a light, it just reflects light, and it’s hardly “great”.

And the ancients clearly did not know that the Sun is a star, and that therefore a lot more than 2 “great lights” were created.

And what exactly is “firmament?”

Adn if the Big Bang took place 6 cosmic “days” ago, then each “day” is over 2 billion years long. Therefore, most of the history of life took place in the last few hours on the 6th day. And it’s still very early on the 7th, God’s day of rest. That would explain a lot.

[Mangetout]

@sqweels

And what exactly is “firmament?”

Don’t know, but:
-There are stars in it
-There is water above and below it

I think it sounds like a solid sky dome or roof of other shape, in which the stars are embedded.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@Mangetout

Don’t know, but:
-There are stars in it
-There is water above and below it

I think it sounds like a solid sky dome or roof of other shape, in which the stars are embedded.

It’s from a Hebrew word (raqia) meaning something which is “stretched out,” generally in reference to something like a sheet or a tent. It can also refer to a thin sheet of metal which has been pounded flat and thus expanded or “stretched.” In any case, it’s always something solid and in Genesis it clearly indicates a belief that the sky is a solid dome or canopy of some sort.

Apologists try to say the word means “expanse” (which it doesn’t) and that the usage in Genesis refers to nothing more than the atmosphere. Beisdes being a phony translaton of the word, it also presents a problem in that the raquia in Genesis is alleged to have stars in it (which Earth’s atmosphere does not) and that it’s got a whole bunch of water on top of it.

Genesis reflects a common belief on th part of the ancients that the Earth was a flat disc with a dome over it and with water both on top of the dome and under the earth (which was mounted on pillars).

[x-ray_vision]

@Diogenes the Cynic

I
Apologists try to say the word means “expanse” (which it doesn’t) and that the usage in Genesis refers to nothing more than the atmosphere.

Are you sure it doesn’t?

I found this:

Atheists claim that the firmament (KJV) or expanse (NASB, NIV) was a solid dome in which the stars and sun were placed. However, the Hebrew word, raqia, translated “firmament” is definitely not a solid structure, as indicated in Genesis 1:20, since birds cannot fly through solid material.

http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/false.html

It makes sense since Genesis 1:20 says:

And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

http://www.bartleby.com/108/01/1.html#S1

If Genesis 1:20 also uses the word raqia for firmament as the above apologetic site claims, it wouldn’t make sense that the author would be claiming that birds are flying within a solid structure.

[tomndebb]

@x-ray vision

If Genesis 1:20 also uses the word raqia for firmament as the above apologetic site claims, it wouldn’t make sense that the author would be claiming that birds are flying within a solid structure.

Well, the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1906 describes the situation as

The Hebrews regarded the earth as a plain or a hill figured like a hemisphere, swimming on water. Over this is arched the solid vault of heaven. To this vault are fastened the lights, the stars. So slight is this elevation that birds may rise to it and fly along its expanse.

And the translation “vault” (a solid object shaped to contain air beneath it) also appears in several translations. (I’m pretty sure that the Jewish Encyclopedia compiled between 1901 and 1906 was not written by atheist apologists.)

One cross-check to the “solid”/“non-solid” discussion would be to look at Genesis 7:11 which portrays floodgates in the heavens opening up to release water. If the word raqis is used to describe the location of those gates, then the firmament/expanse is pretty clearly a solid surface (probably in the shape of a vault or dome).

[timtupp]

I’m a bit disappointed at some of the responses. I thought it was evident that what I was presenting was a possible interpretation of the Genesis account, built on supposition and speculation, which would demonstrate that given a slightly liberal reading of the text (and not stretching too far, I don’t believe), the biblical creation account does not conflict with what science has observed. Why bother? Well, as I’ve already explained, I have a strong belief that the Bible is the inspired word of God, based on a very logical and methodical examination of such topics as prophecy, archaeology, and the internal harmony between 40 different writers over a period of 1600 years. Now I know that just makes all you atheists cringe, roll your eyes, and dream of flying spaghetti monsters, but the point of this post wasn’t to discuss the authenticity of the Bible or the existence of God, although I suppose these topics are inevitably intertwined. It follows, however, that as a result of my faith in God and the Bible, I would be very inclined to believe the Genesis account, regardless of how simplistic it might sound.

Incidentally, repeated comparisons to contemporary creation myths seem rather hollow. By comparison to most, the Bible’s account is pretty boring, simply saying that God made everything, in a particular order. What’s more, that order is not unrealistic, if you had actually read my explanation. Instead, you argued against something I wasn’t saying.

@Musicat

That’s a BIG assumption. And that’s assuming what we are trying to prove. Wrong sequence.

As noted, I’m obviously not trying to prove anything via the creation account. I was trying to defend it by showing that it’s not as full of holes as you critics love to claim.

@John Mace

If we start off assuming the essential truth of the creation account in the Bible, then the debate is over. It’s a mistake to try and reconcile Genesis with science.

What an interesting statement. So is it a mistake to reconcile any religious belief with science? That’s an easy statement for an atheist to make. Little bit harder to swallow for someone who has a very strong, personal belief in God and the Bible. In my original post I said that I wanted to reconcile the creation account with the theory of common origin. In hindsight, that’s not entirely accurate. It would be clearer to say that I want to reconcile my beliefs with the observations of science. That’s why I found the initial posts interesting. I’m interested in knowing that the 23 pairs of human chromosomes show evidence of the merging of two primate chromosomes. The supertrees showing the common features among animal life and the corresponding timelines is most certainly of interest. But telling me that I’m barking up the wrong tree to even try and harmonize two disparate fields of evidence (and yes, I would say that my study of the Bible has absolutely provided evidence) is not going to resonate. You’re asking me to simply ignore many years of study and reasoning.

@Musicat

The interpretation of “day” is a vital point. The Hebrew word “yom” appears in the bible 1480 times, and is translated 54 different ways in one version, yet I doubt that the ancients considered the biblical day as anything other than 24 hours.

Sorry. Simply not true. Here are few examples (taken from the book Life - How Did It Get Here? By Evolution or Creation?): “Day” as used in the Bible can include summer and winter, the passing of seasons. (Zechariah 14:8) “The day of harvest” involves many days. (Proverbs 25:13, Genesis 30:14.) A thousand years are likened to a day. (Psalm 90:4; 2 Peter 3:8, 10) You can add to that terms like “Judgment Day”, and the “Day of the LORD”, which clearly do not connote 24 hour periods.

@Musicat

If a day was an eon, you have a serious problem with a half-eon of dark for plants. Then you have to account for just how it was dark, then light for so long, then how days suddenly became 24 hours long. Did the earth stop rotating, then pick up speed all of a sudden?

Guess you weren’t reading closely. Note that I said light reached the planet’s surface on Day 1, just like what you would observe on a day of complete cloud cover. The Sun, Moon, and stars became clearly visible entities on Day 4, so there was no problem of plants having to grow without light.

@Musicat

But if a mention of dinosaurs were included in sacred writings, and later, dinosaur bones were found, wouldn’t that be stronger proof that the bible isn’t just an ancient legend? Why didn’t God tell us about DNA? Galaxies? Electricity? Calculus? Rocket science?

As I noted earlier, such additional details would not have been useful to people at the time. I agree, though, that a few details which could not be confirmed until much later would have been a handy way to reinforce divine authorship. For that matter, God could have made the entire Bible a whole lot more simple, straightforward, and impossible to dismiss. I believe that there’s a very good reason he has obfuscated things to an extent, the creation account included, but a full explanation is outside the scope of this post and would no doubt be subjected to attacks which I have no desire to argue at the moment.

@Musicat

Modern genetics has shown that there is very little difference between humans and our closest relatives (99% similarity with chimpanzees, 97% with mice [the exact numbers vary according to the source]). As to a soul, that is entirely a religious concept. If humans have one or chimps don’t is something science cannot answer.

One of the ritually recurring arguments for common origin is the amount of shared genetic material. To say that this favors evolution over specific creation is to imply that you have some idea how a divine being should go about the business of being God, as if to say “surely if I were God I would not reuse my former work when designing new creatures.” I’ll elaborate on this point when I have more time, but I find this “evidence” far less convincing than you think I should.

As to “souls”, I never said humans have one and chimpanzees don’t. According to the Genesis account, God cause the earth to be filled with living “souls” (referring to animals). And according to Eccl 3:18-20: “I, even I, have said in my heart with regard to the sons of mankind that the [true] God is going to select them, that they may see that they themselves are beasts. 19 For there is an eventuality as respects the sons of mankind and an eventuality as respects the beast, and they have the same eventuality. As the one dies, so the other dies; and they all have but one spirit, so that there is no superiority of the man over the beast, for everything is vanity. 20 All are going to one place. They have all come to be from the dust, and they are all returning to the dust.”