In the ongoing battle between skill and creationism , evolution is usually a main point of contention . The thought that all sprightliness on Earth evolved from a common ancestor is a major job for creationists . As a geologist , though , I think that the rocks beneath our feet offer even better arguments against creationism . Forthe creationist modeldoesn’t square with what you may see for yourself . And this has been known since before Darwin wrote a discussion about organic evolution .
What the rocks say
I do n’t have to journey very far to make this causa . There ’s a slab of polished rock music on the rampart outside my department bureau that rebut so - calledFlood Geology : the view that a globular , world - shattering flood explains geologic chronicle after the initial founding of Earth by God . This eight - ft - long slab is a conglomerate – a rock made from body of water - worked fragments of older rocks .
It ’s what you ’d get if you buried a river bottom pen of many unlike types of rock deep enough below ground for temperature and pressure to forge it into a new rock . Preserved in it , you could see the original particles of sand , crushed rock and cobblestone made of various kinds of rock . And if you look closely you may see some of the cobble are themselves conglomerate — rocks within rocks .
Why does this disprove the creationist opinion of geology ? Because a conglomerate made of fragment of an older conglomerate not only requires a first round of eroding , deposit , and burying deep enough to turn the original sediments into careen . It requires another pass through the whole cycle to turn the 2nd pile of aqueous sway fragments into another pudding stone .
In other words , this one rock shows that there is more to the geological disk than creationists describe in their scripturally - rede interlingual rendition of earth history . A single grand outpouring can not explain it all . adopt untried Earth creationism means you have to empty religion in the story told by the rocks themselves . This , of course of instruction , is no surprise to geologists who have established that the cosmos is one thousand million of years onetime , far older than the 1000 of years that creationists guess from adding up the generation enumerated in the Bible .
Early Christians read nature as well as the Bible
In explore my bookThe Rocks Do n’t lie down : A Geologist Investigates Noah ’s Flood , I looked into the history of thought about the scriptural flood . What I found surprised me on two spirit level . First , most of the other doer who pioneered what we now call geology were clergy consecrated to read God ’s other book — nature . secondly , in pitting science against Christianity , today ’s young Earth creationists basically ignore centuries of Christian theology .
For the first thousand age of Christianity , the church think literal rendering of the stories in Genesis to be overly simplistic interpretations that omit deep meaning . Influential creative thinker like Saint Augustine and Saint Thomas Aquinas make that what we could learn from canvas the book of nature could not conflict with the Bible because they deal the same author . Yes , it seems that one of the oldest tradition in Christian thought holds that when reason contradicts favored interpretations of Book about the instinctive world then those interpretations should be reconsidered .
In keeping with this view , mainstream Christians reinterpreted the scriptural tale of the creation and photoflood after geological discoveries give away that Earth had a longer and more complicated story than would be inferred from a literal reading material of Genesis . Perhaps , they concluded , the days in the week of creation jibe to geologic ages . Maybe Noah ’s inundation was not spherical but a annihilative Mesopotamian flood .
Young Earth creationists break from history
Interestingly , one can challenge Flood Geology on biblical cause . What did Noah do in the scriptural history ? He carry through two of every hold out thing . So consider the pillowcase of fossil , which creationists impute to the flood . What you find oneself in the rocks is that more than 99 % of all species entombed in the rock record are extinct . This simple fact offers a stark contrast to what you would expect to feel based on a real reading of the biblical story .
After look into the long history of involution and cross - pollenation between geology and Christianity , I find it queer that the conversation constantly gravitates to arguments for and against evolution . pretermit is how the vernal Earth creationist ’s literal reading of biblical stories runs afoul of basic geologic observations — like that slab of sway on the wall near my office .
A key point that gets lost in debate over the modern perception of struggle between science and religion is the degree to which this is actually a fight within faith over how to view science .
This article was originally publish onThe Conversation . interpret theoriginal article .
David R Montgomery is a Professor of Earth and Space Sciences at University of Washington . Top range is Noah ’s Ark of the Covenant on the Mount Ararat by Simone de Myle ( 1570 ) and isin the public domain .
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