Since the auhor is no creationist, may I assume that you aren’t either? i just like knowing where peopel are coming from.

Let me answer that by cross-posting a comment I made on Facebook in response to a similar question:

The argument Perry makes is really geared to anyone who is interested in evolution and design; it isn’t really about creation. I believe Perry is a theistic evolutionist himself, but he did not persuade me of theistic evolution. Rather, he persuaded me that DNA is a code which functions like a highly sophisticated computer program and is very obviously designed by someone vastly smarter and more knowledgeable than any human.

I wouldn’t think that any informed young earth creationist would find his conclusions problematic. On the contrary, as someone who leans toward YEC myself, his conclusions supported the view that there must have been a rapid explosion of species from the created kinds in Genesis 1—an explosion that couldn’t occur using a slow, “buggy” mechanism like random mutations. A YEC would go into this book expecting that DNA works quite differently than an atheist believes—and he would find corroborating evidence in spades.

The difference in opinion between Perry and me, or theistic evolutionists and YEC in general, is in how you combine the nature of DNA with beliefs about the age of the earth and how the fossil record should be interpreted. “Smart” DNA + ancient earth + traditional fossil record tends to lead quite naturally into theistic evolution. “Smart” DNA + young earth tends to lead naturally into a robust creationism.

I don’t have a settled opinion on the age of the earth, mostly because I don’t know what “age” is supposed to mean. I don’t understand the argument that says God cannot create a mature creation 6,000 years ago, for example—and I don’t know how to measure the age of such a creation if he did. If he created a 4.3 billion year old earth 6,000 years ago, does that make the earth 4.3 billion years old, 6,000 years old, or 4,300,006,000 years old? Seems like a case of asking the wrong question.

I actually think one of the key strengths of Perry’s book is that, while he states his view on the age of the earth, and argues from starlight that the universe must be ancient (which is a good argument), he doesn’t get sidetracked in speculative reconstructions of past events. He doesn’t say, “This is what it looks like happened X million years ago.” Rather, he focuses very strongly on what does currently happen. What does DNA do now? What can we conclude from that about its origin? And then, with that foundation of hard science—nothing like the just-so stories of the evolutionary narrative—he says, “How would this apply to things like the Cambrian explosion?” And he gives a realistic, plausible mechanism for that.

But of course, you don’t have to interpret the fossil evidence to point to the Cambrian explosion to benefit from the hard science that comprises the real point of the book. So a YEC can accept and use all of his DNA evidence to crush the secular view of evolution, even if he has to also defend his view on the age of the earth while doing it. Or he can just grant the age of the earth for the sake of argument, and show that DNA needs a designer and couldn’t possibly be a product of natural processes acting mindlessly and mechanistically.

What do you mean by God creating a 4.3 Billion year old earth 6,000 years ago? Are you referring to something like Opthalmos? In that case all science is simply a pragmatic tool? I don’t necessarily see a problem with that, but isn’t Opthalmos kind of ad hoc?

I’m not saying Omphalosism is true; just that I don’t see why it cannot be true. The scientific critique that it is unfalisifiable strikes me as irrelevant. Empirical falsifiability is not the criterion for knowing truth. And the religious critique that it is deceptive strikes me as misguided. We can be mistaken about the way the world is because we made bad assumptions about how God went about making it; not because God intended to deceive us.

Incidentally, I don’t think this reduces science to a mere pragmatic tool; it simply puts science in its proper place as a secondary truth-discovery method.

So, I have a late question. :) Since I commented on your review I have read Omphalos by Gosse. I found it interesting that he actually noted the issue of deception in his book and dealt with it in a way I found acceptable. My issue with Omphalos doesn’t really have anything to do with the ability to verify it scientifically, that doesn’t seem to me to be the problem. However, the flood does seem to be a problem for the theory, for certainly, it seems to me, the flood would have been a catastrophic event that left its mark on the geological record. Since, evidence for the flood isn’t very good IMHO, I have to wonder if we shouldn’t ascribe Omphalos to the post flood world. In that case we would say that civilizations that seem to be in existence (like Egypt) around the time of the flood would be um… not real. I don’t know why but that is really hard for me t
o accept. Maybe it is a psychological thing, but yeah…Is that something we would want to say?

I should add, maybe it is the ad hocness of the hypothesis that I have a hard time stomaching. As I re-read my comment it looks like it is the inability to verify the flood (comment about geological devastation), but that isn’t it. It is more that I am not sure what the reason for such a theory, is it only that the evidence seems to contradict the scriptural account? I don’t know if I want to go there…

Well, geologically the rate accumulation of certain natural and artifactual material puts a severe strain on Young Earth Creationism. For instance the abundance of stone tools that would have had to be created in a short time after the flood that has been found in North Africa, on the natural side of things it is hard to see how so much sediment could be present in certain caves where possible human ancestors are found, and where they aren’t found. (Dr. Duff has a good run down on the evidence of one cave, but there are numerous cases with the same evidence. http://thenaturalhistorian.com/2015/11/11/a-strange-testament-to-an-ancient-earth-bat-breath-causes-caves-to-grow-larger/).

For me, I want Young Earth Creationism to be true. I just have very low confidence that it is. Thanks for your time.

Not having done the reading you have, I’m underqualified to answer your questions. For example, I’m not aware of the flood being poorly-attested geologically; I was of the impression that if you work with the assumption that the biblical record is accurate, the flood is quite obvious geologically; but if you work with the assumption that the earth is ancient, that geological evidence gets reinterpreted quite drastically.

There’s also the question of the historic record. If the flood was the kind of catastrophic event the Bible depicts, we should have left its mark on the historic record as well. To the best of my knowledge, it did; widely separated cultures have oral traditions of a great flood, with details that are hard to explain in terms of mere local flooding.

I think it’s totally reasonable to have trouble with civilizations not actually being real. I can’t see how extending the Omphalos Hypothesis to entire cultures makes sense. Why would God create records of non-existent people? That seems categorically different to simply creating the earth old, and then creating people on it.

I do take the flood traditions seriously though. I am reading a couple books on mythology, and there are some parallels from non-Mesopotamian cultures that should make anyone scratch their head. For instance (I can give you the reference later) in a Greek myth there is almost the exact phrase of a woman crushing the head of the serpent, there are Native American legends about a great deluge with a family being preserved from the waters, etc. I have a hard time finding books that deal solely with the flood myths though. It would be helpful to have someone write a book, like Winifried Corduan did about original monotheism, about the universal flood legends. Anyway… hope you are a well.

The flood narrative has separate purposes from what many in the science field would consider. It is a story of faith of a man in the absence of evidence. A story of a man who has a strong faith, but also real weakness. Noah is a real character, at times larger than life, then at times just like the rest of us. It is a story of redemption. So that the extent of the flood is secondary. God commanded Noah to build an arc to rescue the people and beasts that God wanted to preserve. Noah did and was rescued. The world of Noah was violent and perverse. And that civilization was wiped out. And you are right Dominic that the audience probably had very little contact with people from afar that may have contradicted a worldwide flood. The silk road wouldn’t be in full use until many centuries later. And there were still remains of an arc in Turkey in Jesus’ time. And that was enough evidence for the contemporaries of Jesus to not feel the need to contradict him. Even if the remains of the arc may have been 1500-2000 years old at that time or even older.

Elements in Greek mythology are rather outlandish but may be related to what was happening in this realm before the flood, and in that context there may be something to those as well. Not that I believe in a Medusa, but a woman with some wild looking hair could have tortured her subjects. There are no limits to human fantasy, and the capabilities to embellish around a core of truth..

Based on my own Bible study I am no longer completely convinced that the flood had to be a global catastrophe. In several places, the Bible refers to the World and it ignores the areas outside of the Near East and Middle East, namely China, much of Africa and obviously Americas, though often including the Mediterranean. In that view, would a flood in the area of the Mediterranean / Black Sea / Caspian Sea be a reasonable area to focus on? If these areas were drier because of the ice age and the sea levels in the oceans lower, could the possible barriers of Gibraltar and or Bosporus have given way in a storm that would have caused a massive flooding of these previously dry plains?

Hey Joe, I don’t have a very considered opinion on that. Exegetically, I think it’s possible the flood was local. However, I’ve heard arguments that a local flood in Mesopotamia wouldn’t be sustainable for so long due to the topography acting as a natural drainage mechanism. On the other hand, you have to explain the presence of difficult facts like marsupials in Australia. Presumably Noah didn’t have any of those on the ark.

Either way, it seems to me the point of the flood narrative is not to precisely describe the geographical boundaries of the flood, but rather to emphasize that it destroyed all people except for Noah’s family—with the possible exception of some Nephilim. My concern would be with a view of the flood that preserves that key intent, rather than trying to preserve geographical information which the authors and audience probably didn’t have any knowledge of, nor concern for.