Noah's Flood

[Outrider]

To be honest, they don't seem to have spotted it. If they have, they haven't acknowledged that existing layers of sedimentary rock cannot be more than a few tens of millions of years old, based on current erosion rates.

Except that:
-  what are currently exposed sedimentary rocks might well have been covered by other rocks in previous millenia
 - erosion rates vary with climate, which has changed considerably over time
 - erosion rates are independent of the various mechanisms which replace surface rock over time

Someone did once say that eroded material gets re-deposited on continental shelves, but that doesn't help.

It does when you realise that over millenia what is currently continental shelf becomes continent...

O.

[Spud]

what are currently exposed sedimentary rocks might well have been covered by other rocks in previous millenia

Yes- Eg in Grand Canyon, where the remains of other sediments a mile or so deep, which would have covered the sediments that are still present, are seen some distance from the canyon.

[Maeght]

Yes- Eg in Grand Canyon, where the remains of other sediments a mile or so deep, which would have covered the sediments that are still present, are seen some distance from the canyon.

Tell us more.

[Gordon]

Yes- Eg in Grand Canyon, where the remains of other sediments a mile or so deep, which would have covered the sediments that are still present, are seen some distance from the canyon.

Ah - I seem to remember you coming up with this same creationist crap about the Grand Canyon a while ago, Spud, and I think it was only Richard that could be bothered enough to kick it into touch: you really need to keep away from these lying creationist websites Spud, as I noted in relation to the last one you cited.

Try some proper science literature for a change.   

[Spud]

Gordon, I don't think anyone is lying as such. Rather, both sides come to different conclusions from the evidence: creationists believe that the Bible is true and therefore conclude that the sediments were laid down catastrophically; non-creationists make the assumption that the same processes we see today whereby sediments build up on the ocean floor, have gone on uninterrupted for millions of years. Both sides use specific observations to support their conclusions, such as soil layers for old-earthers; polystrate fossils for creationsists.

[Shaker]

Gordon, I don't think anyone is lying as such. Rather, both sides come to different conclusions from the evidence: creationists believe that the Bible is true

On absolutely no grounds whatsoever.

[Gordon]

Gordon, I don't think anyone is lying as such. Rather, both sides come to different conclusions from the evidence: creationists believe that the Bible is true

Then if these creationists aren't liars they are idiots: that said 'idiotic liars' seems just about right based on the content of their web-sites - they are liars Spud!

The Earth is very old and no amount of posturing by the chronically credulous masquerading as 'creation scientists' and who make ridiculous attempts to claim their 'God' as a valid geological theory will change that: creationism is quite simply abject nonsense (as is 'God'). 

[Hope]

I'm afraid I tend to put creation-ists and scientism-ists in the same category - both endowing their particular understanding of reality with unreal power.

The only thing I can say for creationism is that, if God is a omnipotent as everyone seems to claim him to be, he could quite easily have 'weathered', 'fossilised' and 'half-lived' everything to appear to be as old as non-creationists believe it to be.  The problem I have with that is 'Why?'  What's the point?

[Shaker]

I'm afraid I tend to put creation-ists and scientism-ists in the same category - both endowing their particular understanding of reality with unreal power.

The only thing I can say for creationism is that, if God is a omnipotent as everyone seems to claim him to be

So you don't, then?

he could quite easily have 'weathered', 'fossilised' and 'half-lived' everything to appear to be as old as non-creationists believe it to be.  The problem I have with that is 'Why?'  What's the point?

The problem I have with it is: "How would you know?"

[Gordon]

I'm afraid I tend to put creation-ists and scientism-ists in the same category - both endowing their particular understanding of reality with unreal power.

.

Nope: the two aren't comparable, where the former are liars for God and the latter make no claims that aren't supported by evidence and theory that is naturalistic - more importantly, for science nothing is fixed and sacred and 'we don't yet fully understand' is a perfectly reasonable stance.

[Hope]

...  the latter make no claims that aren't supported by evidence and theory that is naturalistic -

Precisely, Gordon, they put all their faith in naturalistic thinking, the exclusivity of which there is no evidence.

[Shaker]

Precisely, Gordon, they put all their faith in naturalistic thinking, the exclusivity of which there is no evidence.

Firstly it isn't faith, since we're talking about evidentialism here.

Secondly, there are no other contenders for a consistently accurate and reliable method for understanding the world. Sure, from time to time you get cranks spouting off about other kinds of reality and other ways of knowing, but without fail, whenever you ask them to put something on the table and show their working, each and every time they suddenly remember they've left the gas on and disappear. Every time.

[Hope]

So you don't, then?

I was pointing out that even the atheists here seem to use this as taken as granted in many of their arguments.

The problem I have with it is: "How would you know?"

In view of the conditional nature of the proposition, that would seem to be an irrelevant problem.  Anyone who has the power to do something, could do it without anyone knowing.

[Shaker]

Dodge, dodge, duck, dive, bob and weave.

Pitiful.

[Hope]

Firstly it isn't faith, since we're talking about evidentialism here.

OK, where is the evidence that the naturalistic approach is the sole valid approach?

Secondly, there are no other contenders for a consistently accurate and reliable method for understanding the world. Sure, from time to time you get cranks spouting off anout other kinds of reality and other ways of knowing, but without fail, whenever you ask them to put something on the table and show their working, each and every time they suddenly remember they've left the gas on and disappear. Every time

So, they behave in much the same way as the naturalistic thinkers who, whenever asked for the evidence for their understanding, bluster with suggestions that 'there are no other contenders for a consistently accurate and reliable method for understanding the world'; there is no reference to material evidence for its sole validity.

[Hope]

Dodge, dodge, duck, dive, bob and weave.

Pitiful.

Good to see you accepting your behaviour.

[Shaker]

OK, where is the evidence that the naturalistic approach is the sole valid approach?

You could start with the stunning and consistent success of the scientific method in actually understanding the world, not making handy-wavy assertions about it. After that, you could start asking around of these cranks who bang on about other kinds of reality and so forth and ask them to give a methodology for what they claim to know.

I hope you have better luck than I do - in my experience they all run away.

So, they behave in much the same way as the naturalistic thinkers who, whenever asked for the evidence for their understanding, bluster with suggestions that 'there are no other contenders for a consistently accurate and reliable method for understanding the world'; there is no reference to material evidence for its sole validity.

See above.

[Shaker]

Good to see you accepting your behaviour.

Are you four? "Yeah, I know I am, so what are you?" is immature even for primary school pupils.

[Gordon]

Precisely, Gordon, they put all their faith in naturalistic thinking, the exclusivity of which there is no evidence.

For there to be 'evidence' at all there needs to be a method within which said evidence can be firstly identified as being evidence and then categorised, described, measured, analysed and seen within the context of a theoretical model etc etc - all those things that science does within the confines of naturalism.
 
If you are saying, somewhat tortuously, that there may well be an alternative approach that is mutually exclusive of naturalism then you'll need to describe the methodology that applies to this, since if you can't then you must reject any claims that are outwith naturalism as being no more than unsupported conjecture else you'd be floundering in fallacies - again.

[Gordon]

OK, where is the evidence that the naturalistic approach is the sole valid approach?
So, they behave in much the same way as the naturalistic thinkers who, whenever asked for the evidence for their understanding, bluster with suggestions that 'there are no other contenders for a consistently accurate and reliable method for understanding the world'; there is no reference to material evidence for its sole validity.

No blustering involved, since without some kind of non-naturalistic methodology that is comparable with the discipline of the scientific method then the only reasonable conclusion is that, as things stand, naturalism really is all there is - and that that without some comparable non-naturalistic methodology any claims of the divine (all of them) are best considered as being fallacious nonsense. 

[Gordon]

OK, where is the evidence that the naturalistic approach is the sole valid approach?

Non sequitur: since any 'evidence' would involve there being an acknowledged, verifiable and reliable non-naturalistic methodology - and there isn't one.

The burden of proof is yours here.

[Sebastian Toe]

OK, where is the evidence that the naturalistic approach is the sole valid approach?

OK, where is the evidence that it isn't?

[Outrider]

Gordon, I don't think anyone is lying as such. Rather, both sides come to different conclusions from the evidence: creationists believe that the Bible is true and therefore conclude that the sediments were laid down catastrophically;

That's not coming to the conclusion from the evidence, that's pre-supposing the conclusion from the story.

non-creationists make the assumption that the same processes we see today whereby sediments build up on the ocean floor, have gone on uninterrupted for millions of years. Both sides use specific observations to support their conclusions, such as soil layers for old-earthers; polystrate fossils for creationsists.

Polystrate fossils are a perfectly well-explained phenomena that SUPPORTS the scientific consensus.

O.

[Outrider]

Precisely, Gordon, they put all their faith in naturalistic thinking, the exclusivity of which there is no evidence.

Is there any need for it to be exclusive? It works, so they accept it - if you can suggest any other methodology that works, they'll accept that, too.

Until and unless you can, they aren't doctrinarily ignoring other methods, they're just pragmatically limiting themselves to methods that actually work.

That's not 'faith', that's working from the available information: trust. This difference has been repeatedly explained to you.

O.

[Shaker]

Is there any need for it to be exclusive? It works, so they accept it - if you can suggest any other methodology that works, they'll accept that, too.

Until and unless you can, they aren't doctrinarily ignoring other methods, they're just pragmatically limiting themselves to methods that actually work.

That's not 'faith', that's working from the available information: trust. This difference has been repeatedly explained to you.

And every bit as uselessly as everything else that's ever been explained to him.