"75+ years after the Kensington Rune Stone was found, there is still heated debate over it. Why? Because historians just know that there were no Templars in America in the 1300s. (Which, BTW, is also a pretty good argument about the innacuracy of being able to tell anything at all with any certaintly about the Earth's history. If we can't use our scientific methods, e.g. carbon dating, etc, to arrive at a solid conclusion about something that's just a few hundred years old, how can we possibly be so arrogant as to think that we have any grasp on what happened 65 million years ago?!)" You certainly are free to argue your point with whatever evidence you have, but you should not use misleading statements that are simply incorrect. Carbon dating uses the decay of radioactive carbon and the assumption that the mix of carbon isotopes incorporated into plants can be calibrated and remains constant or close enough that only minor adjustments are required. Due to the rate of radioactive carbon decay, this method can only be used for relatively recent dating. It cannot be used for 65 million years and even less so for 4 billion years. Establishing various geological "clocks" has been a long and arduous process. Nevertheless the half-lives of all radioactive isotopes are now known and do not change. Calibrating the date for a given ratio of a radioactive isotope and its daughter product in the natural environment takes considerable data and effort. Scientists challenge each other no matter what the topic, often on quite minute details of research. You can be sure that once a certain geological clock has been accepted by the geological science community, it's a good measure of time in the range that it's been calibrated for. You can be quite certain that an isotope with a half-life of a million years has only half of its initial amount present after one million years. The problem that scientists had was in figuring out how much of the decay product was initially present. They had to rely on geology and chemistry to figure that out. Then they used independent age estimates from other sources to validate their findings. We live a wonderful and possibly unique world. Enjoy it as it is. When I look out of my window at the trees, I can almost see the chlorophyll converting sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide into carbohydrates and oxygen. When I look at the sky, I see blue from sunlight scattered off of molecules miles high above me. Blue is scattered about eight times more strongly than red. Driving a car reminds of the conservation of energy and momentum. I love the vistas that science provides me on the world.
For the record, I said "e.g. Carbon dating, etc." Meaning that more than one scientific method has been attempted in determing the age of the Kensington Runestone. None of them can come up with any sort of solid age (or even age range). The point wasn't that Carbon Dating is inaccurate, but that all scientific dating methods are flawed.
You might as well say that all science is flawed. Everything human is flawed in some sense of the word. The flaws in dating are small and not orders of magnitude. Although we can list of value of pi to as many decimal places as we wish, we cannot measure the speed of light to as many as we wish. Therefore, the measurement of the speed of light is flawed. Is if off by a factor of ten or one hundred or a million? I think not. The same is true of dating. The accuracy of dating is not in question but its precision is. The precision of these dating techniques depends on several factors. The error bars may be large if the sample is very small, has been contaminated, or has a composition that requires extensive preparation. The dating techniques are less precise at the ends of their usable ranges. Thus, a date from a few hundred years ago may have a precision of years or of decades. A large enough error range can affect historical scholarship but not the basic science.
So because it's only off by a little, it's an acceptable error? That's ridiculous! Wrong is wrong is wrong. Something is either wrong or right. It can't be kind of wrong or kind of right and still be a fact. When some researchers have concluded that the runestone was created around 2,000 years ago and others have concluded (using many of the same methods) that it was created around 100 years ago, "science" can not be trusted.
This is basic to science as a whole. EVERY piece of data that we have is accurate within limits of error. This has practical implications in daily life. For example, it used to be the case in Britain that you could not be charged for doing 33mph in a 30mph zone because radar guns are assumed accurate to within 10%. In other words, the police could not guarantee that you were doing 33mph, only within 30mph and 36mph. You can reduce the limits of error by conducting more and more independent experiments, by reducing more and more outside variables, and so on. It's simply not possible, though, to claim any number is exact. For dating, this means that an object might be 245 million years old, plus or minus 12 million years. Now, the skeptic might say "you could be 10 million years out?", but this is the nature of things. To be even more precise, scientists usually say something like "we're 99% certain that the date lies between 235 million and 255 million years". They can also say "we're 99.9% certain the date lies between 225 million and 265 million years". When a date is quoted, there are always limits to the accuracy. This gets back to the whole point about probability. There's always a very very remote chance that something could be out of whack, but the chance of this happening is incredibly small (for example, equivalent to finding one particular atom in the entire universe). By definition, it's virtually impossible we'll ever see that in anyone's lifetime, but in theory it's possible. At a practical level, it's very important to emphasize this issue about accuracy when teaching science to our children. For example, there's a big difference between saying I'm traveling at 30mph and at 30.0mph. The first number implies my speed is between 29.5 and 30.5 mph; the second number implies my speed is between 29.95 and 30.05mph. The number may seem the same, but the limits of accuracy are quite different. The second number is more precise.
The whole basis of the scientific method is that the same experiment has to be able to repeated, always getting the same result. IMO, a margin of error is never acceptable in anything you want to call a "fact." If it's a fact, then it's 100% accurate. If it's only 99% accurate, then it's a theory that can't be proven. Sure theories are necessary to the foundation of science, but they are simply starting points. Not end points. To say otherwise is not even logical.
No, that's not true. For some experiments, there can be considerable differences. Imagine you throw a ball as far as you can. The first throw might reach 40 feet. The second throw might reach 42 feet; and so on. After ten throws, you might take the average and conclude you can throw 41.3 feet. If you do the same thing the next day, you might conclude you can throw 41.1 feet. Now, you can remove variables and get closer to repeating the experiment, but there will always be some differences. Even when all other variables are excluded, the uncertainty principle dictates that you'll never have a precise answer. The more you try to measure, the more you'll interfere with the result. At the microscopic level, the random movement of particles will affect the results. When I was doing my physics degrees, I was always very careful to measure the limits of accuracy. When measuring something with a ruler, I could be accurate to, say, half a millimeter. When measuring a temperature, the manufacturer of the thermometer would guarantee accuracy within half a degree, say. With some of the equations of physics, errors can combine in such a way that they yield surprisingly large errors in the final result. No result in science is meaningful without quoting its accuracy (plus or minus something). If you watch an experiment in person, it might appear that the same thing happens over and over, and at the macro level this might be the case. But our eyes are not particularly accurate at measuring things. When you start measuring in detail, you'll find that experiments are not exactly repeatable at all. Fundamentally, this is the difference between Newton's view of the world (determinism) and Einstein's view (probabilistic). We now know that we live in a probabilistic world - and this is crucially important. Indeed, as I've mentioned before, I personally believe that God interacts intimately with our world through probability. Nothing in science, indeed nothing in our world, is 100% accurate. It doesn't work like that. Every 'fact' is a number within a certain range. As I mentioned, we're not just talking about errors here. We're talking about a fundamental attribute of our universe. Nothing is definite; all is probable. It's the way God made it. The improbability may be very very remote (one in trillions of trillions of trillions), but it could happen.
This is something we really do know at this point. Many experiments have revealed how this improbability works - and it permeates all areas of science (but especially physics). People have done some very clever experiments with photons and other basic particles, for example. For a readable account, I'd recommend Brian Greene's books (e.g., 'Fabric of the Cosmos'). When reading the results of some of these experiments, it's almost like playing a game. You think of an ingenious way to avoid uncertainty, and something extraordinary happens to prevent you. As I read through these accounts, I was struck by how deliberate this is. It's almost as if someone, behind it all, is hiding the crucial little details so the results cannot be definite. Our entire world and existence rest on probability and uncertainty. This is perhaps the greatest discovery in science in the last 100 years, and some of the implications are only now being appreciated. And, as with all things of this nature, both science and faith are involved. I keep saying it, but they are two sides of the same coin.
Lindina, I should thank you for mentioning this site. There's a lot of worthwhile reading here. One article says that "For years, evolutionists have claimed that whales evolved from something like a wolf." I remember reading an article with our children about this process happening the other way around--the evolution of whales into wolves; so apparently evolutionists aren't in agreement on that. Anyway, the kids got a "belly laugh" out of whales trying to crawl out of the ocean to walk on dry land, and in the process, developing legs! If it would have been available back then, we would have read this article together with interest: http://www.scienceagainstevolution.org/v3i11f.htm To some people, a site like you mentioned might have more credibility if the sponsor would be an agnostic or atheist, but they also have biases and often report things as "fact" that are pure fantasy, so it's good to read a variety. Thanks!
Agreement comes when evidence comes. Before that, it's modeling and fancy guesswork. There's now a nice series of fossils that show the transition from hippo to whale. Let me try to find a source for you. The results are quite compelling. PS - I found the reference I was thinking of. It's here.
In his book 'The Language of God', Francis Collins (one of the world's leading geneticists and evangelical Christian) explains how specific sequences within our DNA provide the evidence we need to trace our ancestry. They are 'markers' that are replicated exactly in offspring. Occasionally, something odd will happen, and a child has a small difference from the adults - but this happens very rarely. By tracing these markers and their changes through different species, we can see which creatures evolved from which other creatures with a fair degree of certainty. Incidentally, we use the same ideas for DNA testing to obtain criminal convictions and to trace which ethnic groups are related to other groups and how they've migrated over time. It's almost as if God put these markers in place so we have the ability to reconstruct the puzzle. Not only must he have had incredible fun creating our world, but he even wants us to witness his creativity and glory! Here's a nice little video that explains the point. Note what the commentator says: "These markers have no purpose other than to replicate themselves from generation to generation." I suggest that they do have a purpose: They were put there for us to find.
But what about 99.9% or 99.99% or 99.999% or 99.9999%? No measurement is perfectly precise. Absolutely none. You can calculate pi to any number of places you wish. That's mathematics. In the real world, measurements are never perfectly precise. That lack of precision means that no measurement can be perfectly accurate. Understanding science or even just ordinary real world things like construction requires this simple concept.
Your suggestion may have some truth in it. God may have placed similar markers in various kinds of created beings in order to test us to see if we would fall for man's guesses how they got there or if we would believe His Word until scientists would be able to uncover evidence to affirm the facts as related in His Word. Scientists sometimes do admit to such evidence, but science--the study of creation--always lags behind the written account. Exodus 20:10 clearly states that in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is and rested the seventh day. Jesus referred to the commandment where this fact is included in Luke 13:14. He should know. After all, He's the One who did it! And I don't think He'd lie to us...
You're welcome, PH. All I ever claimed about the site is that there is plenty of interesting reading there.... IMHO, the primary author of that site goes out of his way to never say "God did it" or point to God as the only way things could have happened, but rather just point out when evolution or the evolutionists don't seem to make sense. Sometimes it's totally humorous, sometimes it's totally serious, and other times a mixture of the two. I find it very entertaining.
Including the structure of laminin? I think so. I also think God has an incredible sense of humor. (If you ever want to hear God laugh, tell Him YOUR plans!)
It seems that's up for debate too. Some insist it had to be six 24-hour days such as we experience now. Others assure us that "with God, a day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years is as a day". Still others insist that "day" is only a figure of speech, meaning "period fo time" of some indeterminate length, perhaps many thousands (even millions) of years (as we measure time today). I don't think there will be a definitive answer to this until we get to meet Him face to Face and ask Him.
No? But he'd deceive us by making our own senses and the world around us untrustyworthy? The implication of a six day creation and what follows from such an interpretation, a young earth, is that we can't even manage to measure the speed of light and all those "stars" in the sky are bascially equidistant from the Earth. Further, to acheive that, that we really DO live in a geocentric and tiny universe. Despite the fact that every bit of evidence regarding our place in the universe would contradict that. The true scientific implications of such literal interpretations are rarely fully explored and realized...or explained by those who champion such views. My guess is that this is because creationism is really not about science at all. It's really about Biblical interpretation and it started back in the early part of the last century when fundamentalism arose in reaction to biblical scholarship. It's not an argument that science is wrong but really, that the Bible must be read in a certain way.
Quite true. The implications of a literalistic interpretation usually rest on two faulty assumptions: 1) God can do anything. This is patently untrue. God always acts consistent with his personality and cannot act contrary to it. 2) God is testing our faith by deceiving us. This would violate his personality and would mean we can't trust anything written in the Bible. Maybe salvation is one big joke!
