Another Reason Flood Geology Doesn't Make Sense

I've had this post percolating in the back of my mind for a while. I don't know why I got to thinking about it recently, but it's been a while since I've posted on creationism, so here it is.

According to young-earth creationists (YECs), the Grand Canyon was formed by water run-off from Noah's flood, perhaps in as little time as days (the Flood having deposited the sediment in the first place). It's a position they are forced into given the premise that the earth is only about 6,000 years old. How else do you form the Grand Canyon in so short a time?

Two years ago my family and I visited Arches National Park in Utah. Before heading home for the day we stopped at Dead Horse Point, which is near the park and overlooks the Colorado River. (See Utah Geology Show and Tell.) It isn't the Grand Canyon but it is impressive, and if creationists are right it must surely have been formed at the same time as the Grand Canyon. However, something struck me as strange. Have a look at this picture and see if you notice what I did.



If you noticed the U-turn in the river, you are a winner. Here is what it looks like from above, via Google Maps.



Moving water can be extremely powerful. So how is it that water powerful enough to purportedly carve out such large and deep canyons in a short amount of time was forced to make this loop? This isn't an isolated occurrence; use Google Maps to explore the Colorado River and its tributaries and you'll find many other examples of these kinds of meanders. My favorite one is Horseshoe Bend, which is just southwest of Page, AZ.



Again, this is the Colorado River--just about 100 miles upstream of the Grand Canyon. And again, why would such powerful water be forced to take this circuitous route, especially if the sediment was soft--having just recently been deposited? (For more fun, go look up Gooseneck State Park.)

I'm not any kind of authority on geology or hydrodynamics, but I figured I couldn't be the first one to notice this problem. I was right; it's one of a number of problems with the YEC view of the formation of the Grand Canyon listed at talk.origins. The mainstream view on the formation of the Grand Canyon is covered in this Wikipedia entry. It's actually kind of complicated. But lest you think that geologists don't believe in catastrophic floods, read about the scablands of Washington State, where there were possibly as many as 100 catastrophic floods that originated from a lake in Montana.

---

Continue reading...

Climate Legal Alchemy?

The Attorney General of Virginia, Ken Cuccinelli, is launching an extensive investigation into the career of climatologist Michael Mann. Although currently at Penn State, Mann was at the University of Virginia from 1999 to 2005. Cuccinelli has ordered the university to turn over just about every piece of paper, electronic document, or computer code that Mann ever touched while at UVA, and is acting under a Virginia law that allows the state to recover money fraudulently obtained from it. His theory seems to be that Mann's climate work is fraudulent, and therefore Mann should have to return the 500,000 dollars in state grants that he received.

The disturbing thing about this is that there doesn't seem to be any real basis for thinking Mann defrauded Virginia. The hacked emails of 'Climategate' seem to be the sole justification for this intrusive investigation. However, investigations of those emails by Penn State and the British government have not found any evidence of fraud, and none of Mann's publications have been retracted. Cuccinelli is suing the federal government over regulation of greenhouse gases, and it seems likely that this investigation is a fishing expedition undertaken in the hope that some kind of damning evidence can be found to bolster that suit.

Some have suggested that if Mann has done nothing wrong then he should have nothing to worry about, and that his work will gain credibility by being exonerated. But this misses the mark for several reasons. First is the principle of the matter--an AG launching an intrusive investigation into someone with no real basis to suspect fraud. Second, as we've seen with the frenzy that occurred over the Climategate emails, truth can take a backseat to misinformed impressions. At the least, you have to worry that the AG will not understand scientific culture and seek to punish ordinary scientific behavior. (Imagine being privy to legal correspondence where attorneys talk of trying to influence a jury, or trying to get their case before a more favorable judge or moved to a more favorable location. Within certain limits that is normal legal maneuvering, but it sure could sound sinister.)

More worrisome is the potential for the motivated AG to turn a scientific dispute into a legal issue, and the chilling effect that could have on scientific research that is politically unpopular or controversial. The answers to big questions usually come in bits and pieces, and subjective decisions must be made along the way. Further, hypotheses are not often falsified with one experiment. Just as we test and re-test ideas that seem to have merit in order to be sure that they stand up, sometimes we test and re-test ideas that seem to fail in order to be sure they deserve to be buried. In my opinion, passing legal judgment on such efforts and trying to claw back the research money involved is not a precedent we want to set.

Below is a list of some of the people and organizations who oppose Cuccinelli's actions.

UVA Faculty Senate
Nature
The Union of Concerned Scientists
The American Association of University Professors, joining the ACLU
The Washington Post
Even Michael Mann's persistent thorn-in-the-side, Steve McIntyre, opposes it.

Although it doesn't specifically address this situation, a recent letter signed by 255 National Academy of Sciences members, including 11 Nobel laureates, certainly applies. To wit:

We also call for an end to McCarthy-like threats of criminal prosecution against our colleagues based on innuendo and guilt by association, the harassment of scientists by politicians seeking distractions to avoid taking action, and the outright lies being spread about them.

---

Continue reading...

Son of a Neandertal

I've been slow to mention this, but I want to briefly comment on the publication of the draft of the Neandertal genome. The question that has received most of the attention is this: Did humans (i.e. Homo sapiens) interbreed with Neandertals?

Until recently the only evidence on which to base an answer was the morphology of the skeletal remains combined with dating indicating co-existence in Europe and the Middle-East. Initial genetic evidence based on mitochondrial DNA seemed to indicate that there was not any interbreeding, although certain human genes--it could be argued--hinted at the opposite conclusion.

Now that we have a draft of the Neandertal genome--a composite from three individuals--it appears that ancient Neandertals and humans did indeed engage in some limited interbreeding. To understand how the scientists arrived at this conclusion, we need to back up for a moment.

Several lines of evidence indicate that all living humans can trace their genetic roots to Africa. Basically, Africans have the most genetic diversity of all groups of humans. And whether you look at mitochondrial DNA, the Y chromosome, or other genetic markers, when you group them according to relatedness, all non-Africans are essentially a subset of what is found in Africa.

Africa was the birthplace of both Neandertals and modern humans. However, Neandertals had already left Africa by the time humans began spreading throughout the world. They co-existed in some parts of the world for thousands of years, and then around 30,000 years ago Neandertals went extinct.

With that in mind, the scientists compared the Neandertal genome with the genomes of several people from around the world. They found that for a small portion of the genome, the persons from France, China, and Papua New Guinea are more closely related to Neandertals than either are to Africans. The picture will be refined as more genomes are used for comparison, but we now have a broad outline. To put it crudely, at this portion of the genome, Africans have the original 'modern human' version, but Europeans and Asians have the Neandertal version. This suggests that at some point along the way--probably fairly early in the human expansion from Africa--there was some interbreeding.

Since I'm of European descent, I wouldn't be surprised to find that I share the Neandertal version. I guess it's time for an identity crisis.

For more knowledgeable commentary than mine, see Carl Zimmer and John Hawks (an actual anthropologist).

---

Continue reading...

BioLogos and the ANE Context of Genesis

Among the features of BioLogos are a collection of "Scholarly Essays." Two that I want to highlight here, and that I think should be read together, are: "The Biblical Creation in its Ancient Near Eastern Context" by Joseph Lam, and "Biblical Creation and Storytelling: Cosmogony, Combat and Covenant" by Brian Godawa (see link above). These essays are similar to resources I highlighted in my earlier post, Taking Joseph and Brigham's Advice with Genesis.

Both essays address the themes, motifs, and purposes of the creation account in Genesis 1, particularly in relationship to the Ancient Near East (ANE). I am not going to re-hash them; go read them. But I do want to comment on something from the Godawa essay.

First I should say that it makes sense to me that Moses and the Israelites were not prepared to hear about many of the scientific facts and ideas that we take for granted. They weren't dumb, they simply lived in another world. A crash course in physics, geology, and biology probably would not have been that helpful. But even if we accept this, why would God make up the particular story we have in Genesis and the Book of Moses? I think Godawa may have hit on part of the answer.

One of the functions of ancient creation narratives is to literarily encode the religious and political overthrow of one culture by another. When a king or kingdom would rise to power in the ancient world, they would often displace the vassal culture’s creation stories with their own stories of how their deities triumphed over others to create the world in which they now lived....

God was preparing Israel to displace the pagan Canaanites and their gods both physically and literarily, so He inspired this authorship of the creation account to express that ancient Near Eastern motif of justifying transcendent authority and land ownership with a creation story.

I think this is a significant idea for understanding why God would give a less-than scientific/historical account of the creation. It wasn't just that the people would not understand much of what we take for granted, although that was probably part it. God's people needed a creation story that would help to give them a sense of identity and explain why the God of their small nation was superior to the gods of the surrounding empires, and worthy of worship. It was also going to have to compete with the stories of the gods of those surrounding empires. Since they lived in the ANE, it makes sense that God would use the surrounding themes and motifs and re-formulate them into a new creation story with its own theology. A creation account involving millions of years and impersonal, poorly understood laws of nature just wouldn't cut it--and given the culture, it might sound plain crazy.

Obviously I don't know whether this is actually correct, but it seems plausible to me.

---

Continue reading...

BioLogos

If you haven't taken the time to look around BioLogos yet, you should. The BioLogos Foundation was founded by Francis Collins, the former head of the government's contribution to the human genome project, and current head of the National Institutes of Health. The organization is dedicated to helping bridge the divide between science and religion. BioLogos largely reflects an evangelical Christian point of view, and so it's probably best described as a Christian-theistic view of of science. However, it rejects creationism of both young and old-earth types, as well as Intelligent Design.

I'm not particularly informed on the who's-who of religious scholarship, but it looks to me like they've got some quality people contributing content. For example, Peter Enns (whose book, Inspiration and Incarnation I discussed here) has been an active participant.

In the year that it has existed so far, BioLogos has been at the center of at least two controversies. First, Francis Collins was criticized for mixing science and religion, especially after he was nominated to head the NIH. Perhaps in response, Collins resigned from the organization when his government job began. On the broader issue of mixing science and religion, I have some sympathy with the critics--I do think that Collins makes scientifically indefensible statements from time to time. However, based on what I've seen so far, my opinion is that the general criticism is too harsh. I think most of the material is true to the scholarship from which it is drawn.

The second controversy revolved around the resignation of Old Testament scholar Bruce Waltke from Reformed Theological Seminary. Waltke gave an interview that was posted on BioLogos wherein he said that mainstream Christianity is going to have to come to terms with evolution. Apparently his public acceptance of evolution was too much for the seminary. He initially asked BioLogos to remove the video--while reaffirming its content--and BioLogos complied. But I guess the cat was out of the bag, so to speak, and Waltke resigned.

I plan on drawing attention to some of their content in future posts, but in the meantime go have a look around at BioLogos.

Continue reading...

Climategate: Another Investigation, Another Exoneration

Last week a panel appointed by the University of East Anglia released the results of their investigation into the scientific publications of the Climate Research Unit (CRU). The committee consisted of 11 members who were chosen in consultation with the Royal Society. The report is an easy read and is available here. In summary, the panel:

- Found no evidence of fraud or inappropriate manipulation of data.
- Found that statistical methods were not always the best, but it was not clear that use of better statistical methods would substantially change the results and conclusions.
- Recommended that CRU involve professional statisticians.
- Recommended better data storage and documentation.

Of the investigations launched since the breaking of Climategate, three have released reports. The first was an investigation of Penn State climatologist Michael Mann, which I covered here. The second was conducted by the Science and Technology Committee of the British House of Commons (their conclusions here). And this is the third. Although some of these investigations have found things to criticize, none of the investigations thus far have found anything that would significantly alter the state of the science, nor have they found any scientific dishonesty. I don't expect that further investigations will find otherwise, but we will see.

For more on this latest report see Discover Magazine's coverage here and here.

---

Continue reading...

Testimonies I'd Like to Hear at Church

Mormon Scholars Testify is an online collection of essays by LDS scholars of various types that explain why they believe in the Restored Gospel. It's not all high-fructose correlated corn syrup, either. For example, take this passage from Grant Hardy:

I am still bothered by a number of things—the lack of direct archaeological evidence for the Book of Mormon, its anachronistic quotations from Second Isaiah, polygamy, the Mountain Meadows massacre, our exclusive reliance on the King James Bible, our tendency to mythologize our history, our preference for sentimentality over substance, our quickness to label honest disagreements as anti-Mormonism, our devotion to the Boy Scouts, and my own impatience when the church doesn’t speak out more forcefully on moral issues such as torture or access to healthcare.

Or this from Ron Hellings:

I have heard people say that science and religion are two paths to truth. I do not believe that. There is only one path to truth, and to me it seems closer to science than it is to what passes for religion in most people.

Or Armand Mauss:

Much of what I can’t claim to know is routinely included in the testimonies of other Latter-day Saints, whose conventional lists of what seems true and certain to them leaves me baffled at their apparent spiritual attainments.

Yet if you read the full essays, you will find that each is ultimately faith affirming. Perhaps it would not be appropriate--particularly because they would be misunderstood by some, but I wish I could hear more of these kinds of testimonies in our Sacrament meetings.

---

Continue reading...

Q&A with a Member of the Creation Committee

I am excited to present an exclusive interview that LDSSR conducted with Jacob, a member of the Creation Committee.

LDSSR: Thank you, Jacob, for agreeing to this interview. Could you begin by telling us about your job.

Jacob: The Creation Committee oversees and implements the Lord's creation projects in the universe.

LDSSR: So do your projects include the whole universe or more limited areas?

Jacob: Well, the committee oversees the whole universe, but we are sub-divided into regional areas. So, for example, I am on the part of the committee that oversaw your solar system.

LDSSR: OK. Well let's get to the heart of the interest of my readers. Could you tell us more about the time frame and method of creation?

Jacob: Sure. The time frame for Earth and its solar system was six days that would be equivalent to a total of your six thousand years. The methods of creation are proprietary, I'm afraid, but I would say that your Book of Abraham gives a pretty good summary of it.

LDSSR: On the one hand that isn't very surprising. It is what you get in Sunday School, after all...

Jacob: Precicely.

LDSSR: ...but I wondered if you could help me square that with our scientific investigations.

Jacob: That's a big issue--probably more than we can discuss in detail--but one thing you need to understand is that the Creation Committee operates in coordination with other committees that have their own missions.

LDSSR: Can you give some examples?

Jacob: Well, for example, there's the Evidences and Faith Committee. Their mission is to make sure that mortals need to exercise faith. So they make sure that evidences of God aren't too compelling, or in some cases, that the evidence leads in the wrong direction. So, for example, it was their decision to scrub DNA that could support the Book of Mormon. That kind of thing.

LDSSR: Were they also responsible for the portion of the Book of Abraham papyri that were burned in the Chicago fire?

Jacob: Yes, exactly.

LDSSR: Did they have to be so destructive?

Jacob: Well, again, they do their work in cooperation with other committees. Two others involved with that were the Trials and Adversity Committee as well as the Mortal Expiration Committee--we like to call them the Death Squad. The folks on the Death Squad really like the challenge of taking out as many people on their list as possible with one event, while leaving people not yet appointed to die. In a strange way, they find aesthetic value in efficiency.

LDSSR: That's kind of disturbing, but I guess it sort of makes sense. But returning to the scientific evidence--so you're saying that the idea that radioisotopes, and fossils, and DNA, and so forth--that it is all a deception--that that's true?

Jacob: We prefer to say that it is a test. By their very nature, tests involve some deception. But it isn't deception for deception's sake. It's part of a test.

LDSSR: If that's true, it's elaborate beyond comprehension.

Jacob: Oh, those guys from the Evidences and Faith Committee really pay attention to detail. I mean, you don't want to be the one responsible for messing up the mortal probation of several billion souls; I can tell you that.

LDSSR: Well, OK. But don't they go overboard?

Jacob: It's better to be more convincing than less.

LDSSR: But doesn't that run counter to the whole reason for the test? I mean, you've fundamentally deceived--or tested--billions of people in a very convincing way. Don't most of them fail?

Jacob: Actually the success rate is better than you would think because most people don't believe what scientists say, no matter how good the evidence...

LDSSR: I guess I should have seen that coming.

Jacob: ...so really, the worst performers are the scientists, but they make up a tiny fraction of the whole.

LDSSR: So all of that careful scientific investigation and testing amounts to nothing?

Jacob: Well, that kind of irony is popular up here. You know, the first shall be last and the last shall be first--he that is least shall be the greatest--the wise shall be foolish and the foolish shall be wise--and so on.

LDSSR: Why was the test limited to those who lived after the scientific revolution? What about all of those people who lived during times--most of history, really--when God's existence was assumed?

Jacob: Well, again, this gets back to the different committees. For much of mortal history, nature did indeed seem to support the existence of God. However, technology was limited so, as per the Trials and Adversity Committee, people faced a lot of sickness, pain, and death. The Proclaiming the Gospel Committee really needed technology improvements in order to finish up their work in the last days. The question became, how do you give these mortals such technological advancements--which they will use to eliminate their trials of sickness, pain, and death--and still test them? So it was a trade off. The Evidences and Faith Committee and the Trials and Adversity Committee worked together to ensure that a reduction of pain, and so forth, through technology would be accompanied by false scientific conclusions to test their faith--

LDSSR: --made using some of that same technology. Wow. That's...incredible.

Jacob: Hey, these guys are professionals.

LDSSR: I guess our time is up. Thanks so much for your insights.

Jacob: You're welcome. And happy April Fool's Day.

---

Continue reading...