Walter Brown Jr. Video

David B. Fenske (dbfenske@axion.net)
Mon, 09 Mar 1998 01:30:23 -0800

Can anyone help me with any of the following questions which stem from a
video by Dr. Walter Brown, Jr., from MIT, entitled "God's Power and
Scriptures Authority." This video was presented at my church this morning
during the final class in the "Creation vs. Evolution" series. Many of the
points he made are ones I have run across before, but a few are new to me,
and I know I'm going to be asked about them. I'm also curious if any of
you have read or heard his material and what you thought of it.

First, a brief summary. Brown's main thesis takes a "Creation is awesome"
approach which moves into looking at evidence from the biosphere that life
couldn't have evolved (the probability arguments; evidence of design), from
Astronomy that the moon is young (dust and moon's orbit), and from the
Earth Sciences that a worldwide Flood explains all.

He used some of the usual arguments which have been discussed here and
elsewhere in great detail, such as the expectation of hundreds of feet of
dust on the moon. And he subscribes to an age of the earth conspiracy: the
vast majority of dating techniques reveal the earth to be young, but such
data is hidden or squelched.

Here are the points I have some questions on:

1) He claims that the moon is moving away from the earth, that there were
several conferences in Hamburg convened to discuss this problem. The
problem being that you can't go too far back in time before the moon would
have been too close to earth. Has anyone else heard of this?

2) Polystrate fossil trees: a lot was made of these trees that extent
through many layers of strata. The conclusion was that only a worldwide
flood could have deposited these. Is there a standard answer from geology
on how these things got where they are?

3) He mentioned fossils of celite on mountain tops, and of fish and sharks
in mountains, all violently squished down. More evidence for the flood. I
have always assumed these were the remnants of animals who existed in a
shallow sea or such prior to the uplifting of mountains. Am I correct here?

4) The coal in Antarctica: where did the vegetation come from? He claims
from the flood (I assume it's from back in the days when the climate was
different and Antarctica had a different location).

5) Brown claims that "Evolution is scientifically naked," and that no-one
will debate him in writing on any of the claims he makes.

6) His theory of the flood: the hydroplate theory. A huge reservoir of
water used to exist under the crust. A split occured along the
mid-Atlantic ridge (all the way from the north to south pole within 3
hours) and the way sprayed up to a height of 20 miles, producing the water
needed to flood the whole earth, and moving aside much of the dirt along
this crack (this with the force of a huge number of Atom bombs). This
allowed the earth beneath to rise up, forming the mid-Oceanic ridge, and
sent the continental plates flying east and west at 45 mph. As they slowed
down they buckled up to form mountains. The water then drained off
continents into the huge ridges found in the Atlantic.

This strikes me as ludicrous that such massive structural rearrangements
could occur so fast. Wouldn't such massive water/earth eruptions put dust
into the atmosphere, causing a huge greenhouse effect? Wouldn't the heat
released do something climactically? Could the plates really move so fast?

That's all. Again, very well presented. Almost convincing :-)

Dave F.