Blank canvas

1. I've discussed this before. It's a perennial issue in apologetics. I'm going to use a different example to illustrate a point I've made before.

To my knowledge, there's overwhelming scientific evidence for the antiquity of the universe, from multiple interlocking data points. 

From what I've read, the most impressive scientific objection to conventional dating is the preservation of soft tissue in dinosaurs. I'm not qualified to assess that, but it's intriguing. 

That generates a paradox: due to the interlocking nature of the scientific evidence for the antiquity of the universe, if it turns out that there's no scientific explanation for the preservation of soft tissue in dinosaurs, over tens of millions of years, then that invalidates the entire dating scheme. 

If, however, YEC chronology is correct, it's odd that nearly all of the scientific evidence points to the antiquity of the universe while precious little points in the opposite direction. You'd expect the evidence to be more consistent one way or the other.

In general then, I think the effort to defend YEC chronology on scientific grounds is probably a losing argument. That doesn't mean it's necessarily a lost cause–just that if you try to make the argument from scientific evidence, I expect that's doomed to fail. Nevertheless, the anomaly of soft tissue in dinosaurs is fascinating. 

2. A limitation on appeals to scientific evidence is that science operates within a particular framework. But the act of creation lies outside that framework. The scientific framework is the result of creation. So beyond a certain point, you can't extrapolate from the framework to the set up. 

To take a comparison, a painter begins with a blank canvas. There are almost no limitations on what he can put on the canvas. There's no natural starting-point. Rather, he's working from scratch. 

Likewise, a filmmaker begins with a roll of blank film. There's nothing on the frames. He can film whatever he wants. 

The medium imposes almost no restrictions on his range of options. The medium offers no direction. What the artist paints or films is wide open. There's nothing in the medium to indicate where to begin. 

Different painters with a blank canvas paint different scenes. Indeed, the same painter paints different scenes. Give him 50 blank canvases, and he'll paint 50 different scenes. 

Hand different filmmakers a roll of blank film, and they will make different films using the same roll of blank film. Indeed, the same filmmaker will make different films using  rolls of blank film. Nothing in the medium constrains the choice of plot, setting, characters, or dialogue. And in the digital age, it's even mere flexible.  

What's put on film or put on the canvas doesn't derive from the medium but from the mind of the artist. It comes from outside the medium. In that regard, the choice is arbitrary.

That doesn't make it absolutely arbitrary. In a movie with a good plot, there's dramatic logic to where the story begins and where it ends. However, that's internal to the narrative. The medium itself doesn't point in any particular direction. 

Mature creation has antecedent appeal because it parallels the nature of human creativity. And the comparison is even stronger in reference to the divine creator, because God is freer than human agents. He creates the medium. Not only is this an argument by analogy, but an argument from the lesser to the greater. So I find the idea of mature creation powerfully appealing.