Let's open a can of worms

bigsis144

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 7:20 pm

amother [ Coffee ] wrote:

Why can't the torah contradict science when there are countless stories in the torah that obviously defy science. The parshas we've read the last few weeks fly in the face of science.

I have no problem with explicit nissim that contradict science. I will never get into an argument over whether the Mabul happened or not, for example.

But if someone says “oh, dinosaur fossils look older than 6,000 years because the hot water from the Mabul aged everything!” or “we live in a geocentric universe, the theory of relativity just says it’s about your point of view!”

Then I will point out how your understanding of the scientific principles involved is wrong. That’s it.

It makes people look ignorant and desperate when they quote or reference things they are misunderstanding or misrepresenting.

amother

Coffee

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 7:43 pm

bigsis144 wrote:

Can I pick you brain and hear your thought briefly (lol) on your examples of fossils? The 2 most common answer I've heard is that the mabul aged them or that there were previous world before this world and those fossils are from those old world and therefore they are indeed 50 million years old.

Is there another explanation?

bigsis144

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 8:05 pm

amother [ Coffee ] wrote:

A scientific explanation for fossils that still accounts for a < 6,000 year old universe?

*sigh*

There are members of this website who would definitely consider me an apikores, so I won’t go into what I actually believe. I try not to talk about that here.

You can look up old threads of mine if you want, this isn’t the thread for this discussion.

I walk the edge of a knife blade called Belief.
(Oh wow, that sounds needlessly dramatic 🤦🏻‍♀️. That’s my theatrical side coming out...)

Cognitive dissonance is my constant companion.
I respect people with emunah peshuta, but I do not count myself in their number.
For now, I am very good at compartmentalizing my Yiddishkeit and my understanding of science.

tigerwife

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 8:09 pm

Well, each day of creation was actually 1,000 years since they were a day to Hashem but not to humans. So there you go, a world almost 12,000 years instead Smile

Although dinos were only created on day six, so that kind of discounts whatever I just said. Lol.

amother

Green

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 8:32 pm

I’ve never understood why Hashem couldn’t have created the world with fossils already in the ground. And the usefulness of fossil fuels provides an easy answer as to why.
This is such a simple explanation, why do people need anything more?

bigsis144

Sat, Nov 28 2020, 8:40 pm

amother [ Green ] wrote:

That’s a perfectly valid explanation, but not a scientific one.

Philosophically, you can’t really argue with “what if the world was created already looking old”. But then you open yourself up to philosophical comebacks like “but then why 6,000 years? HaShem could have made the world 2 seconds ago and imprinted in us memories of yesterday, which actually never happened” (aka the Matrix argument).

So it’s still a leap of faith to believe in an “old-looking” world.