by Secular Human
In the Beginning
We know the universe in at least 15
billion years old and the Earth is about 4.54 billion years old
according to Wikipedia. We even know where in the sky the 'Big Bang'
originated which the constellation of Virgo. Clearly the universe
was not created in seven days or even 7 billion years.
In Genesis, the Earth is created before
light and stars, birds and whales before reptiles and insects, and
flowering plants before any animals. The order of events known from
science is the opposite.
Scientists know that solar systems are
created around suns from whirling disks of dust, gas and water. The
dust aggregates into larger and larger spheres until small planets
emerge that grow larger over billions of years.
One of the big questions scientists are
still working on is where did all of the water on Earth come from.
Some scientists believe the water was already into the dust cloud
that surrounded the early sun. Others believe that the Earth got
most of its water form comets and asteroids during the Great
Bombardment. which occurred about 4.1 billion years ago.
According to Genesis God separated
light from darkness, and day from night, on the first day. Yet
he/she/it didn't make the light producing objects (the sun and the
stars) until the fourth day (
1:14-19).
How could there be "the evening and the morning" on
the first day if there was no sun to mark them?
1:3-5
Plants were made on the third day before
there was a sun to drive their photosynthetic processes (
1:14-19).
1:11.
How is this possible? No plant can survive without sunlight. God then
lets "the Earth bring forth" the plants, rather than
creating them directly.
God makes two lights: "the greater
light [the sun] to rule the day, and the lesser light [the moon] to
rule the night." But the moon is not a light, but only reflects
light from the sun. If God made the moon to "rule the night",
why does it spend half of its time moving through the daytime sky?
1:16.
Of course, the people of Ur (modern Iraq) worshiped a moon goddess
which may explain this reference.
After making the animals, God has Adam
name them all. The naming of several million species must have kept
Adam busy for a while.
2:18-22.
We also know not every species of animal lived near the Garden of
Eden which was probably in modern day Iraq.
God fashions a woman out of one of
Adam's ribs. Because of this story, it was commonly believed that
males have one less rib than females. When Vesalius showed in 1543
that the number of ribs was the same in males and females, it created
a storm of controversy.
2:19.
More importantly, the first living creatures were asexual and could
reproduce spontaneously. Males have vestigial breasts that suggest
when the first sexual animals evolved which was around 1.5 billion
years ago, males actually evolved from females.
Noah is told to make an ark that is 450
feet long.
6:14-15.
Archaeologists know that the story of the Great Flood appears in many
different cultures and believe the Israelites added this story to the
Bible during the Babylonian Captivity.
The Babylonian story is far
older than the story that appears in the Bible. Archaeologists
believed the Great Flood really describes the a flood that started
when the Tigris and Euphrates overflowed their banks pushing out a
barge filled with caged animals and other goods into the Persian Gulf.
The real story of creation
How was the Earth really created?
Rightardia has alluded to dust cloud around our G-class sun that
eventually formed planets. G-class suns have along life cycle of
10-billion years. Fortunately, the Earth was created in a zone around
the sun where life was possible. The planet was neither too close to
the sun or too far away for life to survive.
The Earth also got the benefit of huge
gas giants much farther out in the solar system which had huge
gravitational pulls. These gas giants attracted a lot of debris that
is floating around our solar system and prevented asteroids and comets
for hitting the Earth. Jupiter, if fact, is so large it could have
became a sun. However, it would have had to have been 60 times as
large as it is to ignite into a sun. tore massive
Around 4.5 billion years ago, the MOON is carved out of Earth by a huge impact. The Mars sized object that hit the Earth deposited most of it iron core on the Earth. This larger iron core created a huge magnetic field around the Earth and also drove plate tectonics. Mars, on the other hand, lost most of its magnetic filed and most of it atmosphere billions of year ago.
