How do you explain dinosaur bones?

PinkFridge

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 5:46 pm

BlueRose52 wrote:

Do you not see that saying G-d created a 5775 year old world that only looks like it's billions of years old is not that far off from saying that G-d is a liar?

Requisite disclaimer: I am not saying G-d is a liar, but rather that many people would reasonably see this position as implying as such.

First off, thanks, Ora, for you post just before this one about people using the "it only looks that way" excuse.

Second, if that makes G-d a liar, then, like the lawsuits, all sorts of things that occurred through written history can make G-d a liar.
Oh, that's right. He has nothing to do with man-made terro and natural disasters. I guess He started the clock and He's on a beach somewhere?

marina

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 5:49 pm

BlueRose52 wrote:

God's already being sued, for breach of contract: http://www.theonion.com/articl.....,423/

I think Reb Leivik of Berditchev actually did this

marina

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 5:53 pm

ora_43 wrote:

No. It's not like anyone is claiming G-d said the world is billions of years old. In fact, people who believe it isn't are saying G-d specifically said the opposite.

L'havdil, but if I wear costume jewelry and you think it looks like real gold, that doesn't make me a liar.

If you wear costume jewelry and I think it's real gold, it probably has no real impact. If, however, you are trying to convince me to invest in your company and wear what looks like real gold as a way to represent your status and wealth and honor, and I am duly impressed and sink all my money into your company... yeah, that's deceitful.

marina

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 5:56 pm

Has anyone posted this yet? Some might find it useful http://www.simpletoremember.co.....m.pdf

PinkFridge

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 6:21 pm

marina wrote:

Has anyone posted this yet? Some might find it useful http://www.simpletoremember.co.....m.pdf

Wow! Thank you.
To anyone opening this, scroll down, it's there.
This is way way out of my league. I'm not going to begin to tackle it fully now, and I wouldn't deign to quote or use it in any way. But to me it goes back to what I've said earlier. If I personally were troubled, I know of very smart people I could ask about this. But I'm not troubled, and I truly don't believe that these people are either. I don't think there's some cabal of brilliant minds who get together, share their blood and say, this is all hokum but we're going to pretend to go along with it and fool the ignorant masses.
No. These brilliant minds tackle the question. And they may come up with answers that blow my mind. The bottom line is, they believe in a Creator, that He communicated with us and that we are both privileged and obligated to study this communication.
Chaval al d'avdin u'dlo mishtakchin.

yogabird

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 6:23 pm

marina wrote:

I think Reb Leivik of Berditchev actually did this

his was more of a plea bargain Wink

BlueRose52

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 6:56 pm

marina wrote:

Has anyone posted this yet? Some might find it useful http://www.simpletoremember.co.....m.pdf

After reading through this, I have no doubt that if Rav Aryeh Kaplan zt"l was alive today, he would either never have said these things or if he had, he'd be put into cherem faster than you can say zoorabbi.

I don't think there's anything in here that's not discussed in much fuller depth in Slifkin's book.

BlueRose52

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 7:20 pm

PinkFridge wrote:

Did you actually see what he said? Because he very explicitly rejected some of the things people here are proposing as valid approaches (and which seemed to me, you somewhat agreed with).

For example, regarding the idea that the world was created looking older than it actually is, he says:

Quote:

The difficulty [regarding this approach] is that one could use a similar argument to say that HaShem created the universe five minutes ago. There is no question that an omnipotent G-d certainly could have created us all with our memories, with all the records, and with all our histories. It is very possible to say that the world was created five minuets ago. But this weakens the above argument. If it is possible that HaShem created the world 6000 years ago, then everything is possible.

Of course, it is an irrefutable argument. Therefore, if one feels comfortable with it, I would say all well and good. But I think that it has problems. It touches almost on intellectual dishonesty and sophism. It presents us with more problems than it answers. It seems to make all of Judaism depend on a glib argument. But there is an even more serious problem. In no place in Torah literature do we find that HaShem created the universe so that it should appear to be billions of years old. If not for current scientific discoveries, no one would have ever made such a statement based on Torah sources alone. Therefore, this approach is nothing more than apologetics.

Regarding those who dismiss scientists as simply not knowing what they're talking about, he says:

Quote:

Another approach is that which many Chassidim have. They say, “What do scientists know? Do they know what’s happening? Do they know what’s going on? They’re a bunch of phonies, a bunch of bluffers, a bunch of stupidniks! Do they really have a way of finding out the truth? They find a bone and they think it’s from a monkey.”

But, I think to somebody who knows what science is, this is a very unsatisfactory approach. We have some idea of what is involved in paleontology. We have some idea what is involved in geology and in radioactive dating. We have some idea of what is involved in astronomy. We can casually speak about a star being a million light years away, and we do not stop to think, “Well, that’s a bit too much!”

So I would say that if someone feels that science is ignorant and false, all well and good. Many people prefer not to accept science as a worthy challenge. But I think that for many of us here, such an approach would be totally unsatisfying.

Regarding the approach of the days of creation being longer than normal days, he writes:

Quote:

There is another approach that I will mention in passing. That is, that each of the “days” of creation was really thousands of years long. This approach is hinted at in Rabbeinu Bechayay, who mentions it only to refute it. He says explicitly that the world was created in six days of twelve hours each, for a total of 72 hours.

Moreover, we keep Shabbos because there were six days of creation, where each day was just like one of our days. Moreover, there is no support in classic Torah literature for saying that the days of creation were more than 24 hours long. Besides this, there is the problem that plant life was created before the sun, moon, and stars, and this would not fit into any accepted scientific cosmology. I will admit that the Zohar states that plant life was created after the sun, moon, and stars, but this raises other difficulties which go beyond the scope of our discussion.

He does indeed offer other approaches to the issue, but the ones that are mostly being offered in this thread he doesn't give much credence to. (Which is partially why I think he'd be put in cherem so fast if he was alive today.)

BlueRose52

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 7:25 pm

Here's another very worthy and very relevant section worth quoting from the booklet:

Quote:

Now let us get back to our kasha. What do we do about the age of the universe?

One problem is that many people have taken a stand on this. When people take a stand on something, it is very hard for them to change their mind. Let me give you a good example. If I would poll this audience very rapidly, how many people here believe in a geocentric universe. That is, how many frum people here believe that the Earth is the center of the universe? Not too many! But would you believe that as little as 50 years ago, seforim were published that said that the correct Torah view is that the Earth is the center of the universe, and that anyone who said otherwise was going against the Torah?

I make this point, and I feel that it is a very important point. Very often people tend to paint themselves into an intellectual corner. Then, once they find themselves painted in, they have no way out. I remember back in Torah V’Daas many, many years ago, we were discussing sending a rocket to the moon. This was long before Sputnik. And I asked one of the people there (I won’t mention his name), “What do you think about sending a rocket to the moon?” He said that it is impossible al pi Torah. It is impossible to send anything out of the Earth’s atmosphere, because above the atmosphere is the yesod ha-aish (the elemental fire), and anything that goes through that would be burned. They showed me seforim that said that.

Obviously, we know that this was not the correct hashkafah. But once you paint yourself into an intellectual corner, it is very hard to get out. As Torah Jews, we cannot afford to paint ourselves into an intellectual corner, from which we will not be able to extricate ourselves.

This is a particular danger when we get involved in any discussion of the age of the universe.

Yael

Mon, Feb 16 2015, 8:58 pm

I think the thread has run its course. If anyone has anything to add please pm me.