Young Earth Creationism Is Improbable

Observations Ob1: Since YEC is so defined, under a shared BoP, Con must demonstrate that the following things are probable--the universe, Earth, and all life were created by God, they were created in a period of precisely 144 hours, and they were created sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago. Ob2: All of Con’s arguments only justify the age of life and the Earth. They do not, in any way, show that the *universe* was created the same time, that it took place in precisely 6 days, and that God created them. Thus, the resolution has not been entirely negated. By the debate structure, these are the only arguments Con is allowed to present, thus Con has not justified YEC. Ob3: Con presents 12 arguments for a young Earth. This is a debating technique called ‘Gish Gallop’, which is generally considered highly misconducted. Thus, I request voters to penalize Con’s misconduct. Ob4: If I am able to demonstrate anything against the definition of YEC, i.e. if I can uphold even one of my arguments, I have successfully affirmed the resolution. Rebuttals #1. The scientific method is primarily based on evidence. There is no *evidence* for these myths, means it is best they are dismissed as improbable, especially if there is evidence to the contrary. #2. This is challenging the essence of scientific studies themselves, thus is a kritik of the topic. Rule 3 explicitly forbids kritiks of the topic. In addition, challenging the scientific studies supporting creationism is also easily possible, thus this attacks both sides. And it is highly improbable that every single study has an exaggeration, or most studies--the exaggeration, in addition, cannot have a 13.8 billion year difference, i.e. it is highly improbable. The same for the age of the Earth and life. #3. New studies have found invalid assumptions made by Haldane while formulating the dilemma. Haldane made an invalid simplifying assumption which negated his assumption of constant population size, and had also assumed that two mutations would take twice as long to reach a fixation as one, while sexual recombination means that two can be selected simultaneously to reach fixation faster [1][2][3]. “[S]ubsequent corrected calculations found that the cost [found by Haldane’s dilemma] disappears.” [4] Thus, recent research shows the dilemma disappears. #4. This is a straw-man of evolution. Evolution predicts that changes take a long time to appear depending on the species, thus such a misrepresentation does not argue against evolution. This argument is a straw-man [5], thus is logically fallacious. #5. Various theories of evolution do predict death, e.g. Peter Medawar’s theory of mammal aging [6]. Evolutionary biology predicts that “[t]he force of selection declines with age.” [7] Thus, aging is not an evolutionary paradox according to new theories. #6. First, this is irrelevant to the resolution. Nonetheless, I shall address it. This is refuted via. radiometric dating, i.e. Pb-U zircon dating. Radiometric dating of the rock formation that contained fossils from the early dinosaur genus Eoraptor confirms that this species is 231.4 million years old [8]. Basic fossil dating suggests lizards, reptiles and dinosaurs did become extinct gradually at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, around 66 million years ago [9]. #7. A ‘universal flood’ is entirely irrelevant to a young Earth. There is also no evidence for a global flood [10], as my opponent asserts. #8. My argument that proves evolution answers this, showing that genetics, etc. actually demonstrates that a process of evolution is likely true. #9. Whether or not they are ‘soft’ is irrelevant, as they were validly dated to be millions of years old. #10. Humans merely have evolved brains that allow us to process language and syntax--evolution has a valid answer for this. There is no reason to believe that communication cannot have arisen via. evolution, or the ability to perceive subjectively (which is shared by many other species) [11]. #11. This is begging the question. Baraminology assumes creationism is true, thus Con is using circular reasoning here. #12. The supposed ‘bad evolutionary arguments’ were not presented by me. Until Con refutes my arguments on evolution, #12 is irrelevant. Now, note that Con has failed to produce an argument affirming that God created the universe, and that the universe is young. By the debate structure, Con *cannot* present such arguments anymore, thus if I defend the universe contention of mine, whether or not I’m unable to refute Con’s arguments, you automatically vote Pro. Thus, I affirm. Over to Con. 1. http://www.talkorigins.org... 2. http://www.gate.net... 3. http://www.talkorigins.org... 4. http://en.wikipedia.org... 5. http://web.uvic.ca... 6. http://www.nature.com... 7. Ibid. 8. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... 9. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... 10. http://rationalwiki.org... 11. http://www.livescience.com...