(October 15, 2010 at 3:39 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: If you knew enough about that beloved physicist's theory, you would know that you can't use a theory that deals with calculated time definition to refute someone who is using observational time definition. Tsk tsk tsk.

Well you do have me at a bit of a disadvantage because I can't invalidate your arguements with things I make up. I'll just have to live with the fundemental laws of the universe as proven through empirical evidence and observation.

(October 15, 2010 at 3:39 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: You keep using high school textbooks, wikipedia, and youtube. I will keep using peer-reviewed scientific journals. I like it better this way.

You know what? You're absolutely right!
You can keep your peer-reviewed "scientific" journals. The fact that I can completely demolish their validity with a basic, high school understanding of math and science makes this conversation all the more entertaining.
Particularly if this Dr. Newton you're using has actual scientific credentials and not just credentials according to whatever theological college he recieved his degrees from, then it's just so much more interesting to me to show how a simple google search completely invalidate's that man's entire line of work.

(October 15, 2010 at 2:52 pm)TheDarkestOfAngels Wrote:

(October 15, 2010 at 12:59 pm)theophilus Wrote: That is because we have observed trees growing and people aging so we can apply what we have learned to trees and people that we have never seen before. But no one has ever observed how the universe began.

Or it's because we've cut a number of trees open and simply noticed that the younger ones have fewer rings than the older ones.
The funny thing is that the oldest tree in the world is older than what creationists believe the earth is.
See how that works? We didn't even need to observe a tree from sapling to death to know something like that. Utterly perposterous notion about observations you have.

(October 15, 2010 at 12:59 pm)theophilus Wrote: Scientific estimates of age are based on the assumption that everything developed by natural means alone without any divine intervention. If this assuption is wrong then all of the estimates will be wrong.

http://atheistforums.org/thread-4052.html

Scientific estimates of the earth's age is based off of empirical evidence and nothing more, nothing less. If the evidence showed 6000 years, then scientists would say 6000 years. If it showed 4.54 billion years, then that's what they'd say it is. Unfortunately for creationists, it's the latter estimate.

Edit: Nice link you provided. It's too bad all of the 'evidence' against evolution and whatnot is wrong.

:-) So tell us if you didn't observe the growth of the trees you cut open, how would you know that the ones you cut open with less rings were younger and the ones with more rings were older? Kind of putting the cart before the horse there.

As to your old trees. Certain genuses of trees can grow up to 5 rings per year. These rings are indistinguishable from true annual rings. Pre-ice age climates also could have caused trees to grow far more than even five rings a year. So counting annual rings (dendrochronology) is not nearly as accurate as you make it out to be.

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(October 15, 2010 at 4:09 pm)TheDarkestOfAngels Wrote:

(October 15, 2010 at 3:39 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: If you knew enough about that beloved physicist's theory, you would know that you can't use a theory that deals with calculated time definition to refute someone who is using observational time definition. Tsk tsk tsk.

Well you do have me at a bit of a disadvantage because I can't invalidate your arguements with things I make up. I'll just have to live with the fundemental laws of the universe as proven through empirical evidence and observation.

(October 15, 2010 at 3:39 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: You keep using high school textbooks, wikipedia, and youtube. I will keep using peer-reviewed scientific journals. I like it better this way.

You know what? You're absolutely right!
You can keep your peer-reviewed "scientific" journals. The fact that I can completely demolish their validity with a basic, high school understanding of math and science makes this conversation all the more entertaining.
Particularly if this Dr. Newton you're using has actual scientific credentials and not just credentials according to whatever theological college he recieved his degrees from, then it's just so much more interesting to me to show how a simple google search completely invalidate's that man's entire line of work.

Ugh, you just don't get the light thing, so I will leave it alone.

Wow, I had no idea that Colorado State was a Christian School! You learn something everyday. So can you tell us all what other "Christian" schools give out doctorates in Astrophysics? I am sure you are fully aware that in order for a school to give a graduate degree, that program must first be approved by all the other Universities in that State right? So even the graduate degrees that are given out at Christian Universities have been given the green light by secular schools.

(October 15, 2010 at 12:59 pm)theophilus Wrote: That is because we have observed trees growing and people aging so we can apply what we have learned to trees and people that we have never seen before.

And we have learned about the rates of decay for certain substances, and we can apply what we have learned to determine the age of rocks, fossils, bones, etc.

Quote:But no one has ever observed how the universe began.

So what? We can make observations about the movement of stars and galaxies within the universe which allows us to draw conclusions with regard to what happened in the past.

Quote:Scientific estimates of age are based on the assumption that everything developed by natural means alone without any divine intervention.

Scientists also perform experiments without assuming that invisible gnomes come in the night and mess around with their petrie dishes. Why would scientists assume there was "divine intervention"? This would just be idiotic.

Quote:If this assuption is wrong then all of the estimates will be wrong.

I suppose so. But you have no foundation for making such an assumption.

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(October 15, 2010 at 3:39 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: Lol, two mistakes in this post. First of all, an approximation is not "proof", so you didn't get anywhere with that.

Determining the age of something in science is all about approximations! Science tells us the dinosaurs died out approximately 65 million years ago. Do you expect scientists to say that the last T. Rex died off on March 3, 64,388,279 BCE?

Also, what if I asked how old you are? You might say "I'm 40". Ah, but wait a minute! Your actual age might be 40 years, 4 months and 6 days (we could really get crazy and include hours, minutes and seconds). We all use approximations when talking about the age of things. As long as the approximation is reasonably accurate (say within an error of 5%) I fail to see why you would have an issue with it.

Quote:Secondly the only reason you can approximate someone's age is because you have observed other people's lives. When was the last time you observed an Earth aging for 4.5 billion years?

That's the great thing about science. We don't need to observe something age for a long time to be able to determine how old it is. And what makes you think the Earth is 6,000 years old? When have you ever seen anything age for 6,000 years?

Quote: So when God says the Earth is young I tend to believe Him, and not you.

"God" spoke to you and told you the Earth is young? Or do you mean that an ancient unknown author who thought the Earth was the center of the universe scribbled this down and you believe it to be true?

Quote: It just so happens there is lots of evidence to back up God's claim on this one, so it's a win-win.

"Lots of evidence"? So far you haven't presented any.

Hey,

I am moving over to "The Statler Waldorf Balcony", don't want to clutter up your guys' board too much so I am condensing all my activity to one thread. See you guys there if you want to keep talking.

SW