From: Jay Willingham (jaywillingham@cfl.rr.com)
Date: Thu Oct 09 2003 - 14:07:15 EDT
----- Original Message -----
From: "Steven M Smith" <smsmith@usgs.gov>
To: <asa@calvin.edu>; <jaywillingham@cfl.rr.com>;
<panterragroup@mindspring.com>
Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2003 1:44 PM
Subject: Pangea and concordism (was RATE)
> Combining posts to include parts relevant to my comments below (hopefully
> without misrepresenting anyone's argument) ...
>
> Jay Willingham wrote:
> >>> One could hypothesize that Pangea's division began in the time of
Peleg
> of Genesis 10:25, "Two sons were born to Eber: One was named Peleg, [
10:25
> [Peleg] means [ division ] . ] because in his time the earth was divided;
> his brother was named Joktan."<<<
>
> To which Stephen Krogh wrote:
> >> Do you have any physical evidence that suggests that the continents
> split after pelegs time, and how recent was Pelegs time? If you ignore the
> Geology, then sure. But why would you do that? Maybe you need to look for
> another event, say, something that happened at a similar time to the day
of
> Peleg, rather than something that occurred several million years prior. <<
>
> Jay's response:
> > I tend to want to date the Bible to try to match the dating of Geology
> through the hypothesis that it was common to telescope generations,
> omitting some for brevity. This telescoping is in keeping with our Lord's
> admonition to not contend over "endless geneologies". A hundred million
> years would involve how many generations? <
>
> Stephen Krogh also wrote:
> >> What was laid out is very sparse. I believe you are straining the text
> to fit an interpretation. No where does it say that the continents split
> apart at the days of peleg. It is not necessary. <<
>
> Jay's response
> > Yes, it is sparce and I may be straining the text but I feel a need to
be
> literal in my approach to the Word but not dismissive in my appraoch to
the
> current scientific thinking and the data that evokes it. In short, I feel
> a need to reconcile the two without doing violence to either. That may be
> impossible but therefore unneccesary. <
>
> Jay,
> I think that this is a commendable attitude (holding fast to the Word but
> not being dismissive of current scientific thinking). But I personally
> think that your desire to create a concordist reconciliation between
> selected Bible verses and Plate Tectonic Theory is unrealistic for several
> reasons.
>
> 1) Like most geologists, I cannot find any way to compress or telescope
all
> of the Earth's history, including Plate Tectonics (or continental drift if
> you prefer), into the Biblical accounts. But for the sake of argument,
> I'll set this objection aside and consider your desired approach.
>
> 2) As has been noted in other posts, current science is a fluid medium
> where ideas are proposed, argued, provisionally accepted, and sometimes
> overturned based on new data ... hopefully asymptotically approaching
> reality but never reaching it. There is a danger in tying interpretations
> of Bible verses to current geologic theories - when current theories
change
> then the Bible is often used to defend the discarded science. One only
> needs to look at literalist or concordist approaches to geology and
> scripture from past centuries to see how silly it appears when Bible
verses
> are tied to ideas long defunct (e.g. Burnet's _Sacred Theory of the Earth_
> 1681, Whiston's _A New Theory of the Earth_ 1696, Hugh Miller's _The
> Testimony of the Rocks_ 1857). I believe that some modern examples like
> Henry Morris' _ The Bible and Modern Science_ (continuously in print under
> various titles since 1946) will also fare poorly.
>
> 3) Finally, if you insist on tieing Genesis to geologic history, why
> correlate the division of the Earth in Peleg's day with the breakup of
> Pangea? Why not with the breakup of Rodinia? ... or Pannotia? ... or
> Laurasia? ... or Gondwana? Current Plate Tectonic ideas propose a history
> of continents something like this (ignoring several smaller assemblies and
> breakups and realizing that there are differing proposals on some of the
> earlier events): (a) Breakup of the Rodinia supercontinent; (b) Assembly
> of the Pannotia supercontinent; (c) Breakup of Pannotia into Gondwana &
> Euroamerica; (d) Assembly of the Pangea supercontinent; (e) Breakup of
> Pangea into Laurasia & Gondwana; (f) Breakup of Laurasia into N. America &
> Eurasia; (g) Breakup of Gondwana into Africa, S. America,
> Australo-Antarctica, & India; (h) Breakup of Australo-Antarctica; (i)
> Assembly of Indo-Eurasia. (You can see animated models of all these
> proposed events at www.scotese.com).
>
> Can we or should we really expect to find Bible verses to reconcile with
> each of these major tectonic events? What purpose would it serve? Would
> our faith in God or our acceptance of science be strengthened if we had a
> one-to-one reconciliation between these proposed tectonic events and
> scripture?
>
> Steve
> (Please cc: me in any replies)
>
> [Disclaimer: Opinions expressed herein are my own and are not to be
> ascribed to my employer]
> _____________
> Steven M. Smith, Geologist, U.S. Geological Survey
> Box 25046, M.S. 973, DFC, Denver, CO 80225
> Office: (303)236-1192, Fax: (303)236-3200
> Email: smsmith@usgs.gov
> -USGS Nat'l Geochem. Database NURE HSSR Web Site-
> http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/1997/ofr-97-0492/
>
>
Steve,
Changes in accepted facts from which hypotheses are derived indeed make past
applications of biblical passages to discredited facts seem silly. However,
these biblical hypotheses are no sillier than scientific hypothesis that
subsequent research shows were erroneous. This is no reason to stop either
process. I simply hypothesized the division of the hypothesized
supercontinent into its parts as starting in Peleg's day.
Jay
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