Last year, SEBTS prof. Kenneth Keathley published a critique of YEC: "Confessions of a Disappointed Young-Earther":
He describes his transition from YEC to OEC. Keathley is one of the better-read critics of YEC. In his article he interacts–albeit rather glancingly–with many of the best YEC scientists. It's a fairly sophisticated critique. So it's worth examining:
1) Keathley's article involves a two-part analysis in which he compares and contrasts the YEC model of The Genesis Flood with contemporary creationism. He points out that contemporary creationists have abandoned many of the arguments in The Genesis Flood. Keathley seems to be insinuating that this undermines YEC. That YEC has been in retreat ever since The Genesis Flood. If that's his point, I don't see how that proves his point.
i) Naturally the newer generation of YEC scientists will appeal to models and evidence which reflect current science. The scientific landscape has changed a lot since The Genesis Flood was published back in 1961. Suppose you compared a 1961 textbook on astronomy, biology, cosmology, physics, or medical science with a 2014 counterpart. There'd be some drastic changes.
For that matter, sometimes the very same scientist (e.g. Stephen Hawking, E. O. Wilson) will retract positions he took at an earlier point in his career.
Keep in mind, too, that due to the interdisciplinary nature of YEC, Henry Morris was often writing far outside his field of expertise. By contrast, contemporary YEC scientists pool their respective specializations.
ii) Moreover, it's not just a case of withdrawing old arguments. For instance, on his blog, Jay Wile periodically posts new lines of evidence for YEC. Keathley might take issue with the new evidence, but the point is that it's not as if YEC has simply been backpedaling ever since The Genesis Flood.
Snelling concedes that much of the geological evidence cannot be reconciled with any interpretation that uses the physical laws, properties and relationships as they presently are. He postulates that God miraculously changed the laws of nature during the Flood.
This raises several issues:
i) I agree with Keathley YEC explanations often seem to be ad hoc. I'm admittedly skeptical about many of the scientific explanations proposed by YEC. I have no reason to believe that's how it happened. I don't mean the Biblical description–I mean the scientific explanation.
However, my skepticism isn't confined to YEC. Fact is, when reconstructing the distant past, our explanations are often just an educated guess. We don't know how it really happened. We don't know the actual cause. Because scientific explanations of the distant past are necessarily ex post facto, they are often ad hoc.
ii) YEC scientists oscillate between natural and miraculous explanations. Again, that sometimes seems to be, or sometimes is, fairly ad hoc. But it's not that simple:
As an OEC, Keathley's own position commits him to alternating between miracles and providence. A natural causal continuum punctuated by discrete acts of fiat creation. So the difference between YEC and OEC is a difference of degree rather than kind.
The same holds true for Bible history, where many natural events are the effect of second causes, but some natural events are the direct effect of spiritual agency.
There is no uniform principle. No consistent modality. For, as a matter of fact, things happen in two or three different ways.
It is not ad hoc in principle to distinguish between miracle and providence. To the contrary, that distinction tracks reality.
It's only ad hoc to arbitrarily assign some events to miraculous agency and other events to providential agency when we are in no position to know how they actually came about.
Appealing to a change in the laws of nature marks a remarkable change in YEC strategy, and in many ways it also makes a significant admission. As a strategy, it indicates an end to any real attempt to empirically establish the historicity of a global flood. Miracles, by definition, cannot be scientifically examined. The appeal also admits that the scientific evidence does not support the YEC model.
That's a very problematic claim:
i) What is Keathley's justification for claiming that "miracles, by definition, cannot be scientifically examined"? Suppose we could take our scientific equipment back in time to the marriage at Cana. We could scientifically verify that the water was H2O. We could scientific verify that the wine was fermented grape juice. Our continuous, high-speed camera footage, from different angles, could scientifically verify that no one substituted wine for water through sleight of hand.
In principle, our equipment could scientifically verify that Jesus was clinically dead. We could go into the tomb on Saturday and scientifically verify necrosis. On Sunday, we could scientifically verify that he was alive. Fingerprints, DNA testing, and dental records, before and after the fact, could scientifically verify that it was the same person who died and revived.
Take sticks becoming snakes (Exod 7). We could scientifically verify that the staff was made of real wood. We could scientifically verify that the snake was a real snake. Our continuous, high-speed camera footage, from different angles, could scientifically verify that no one swapped the staff for a snake.
In principle, many kinds of miracles can be scientifically examined. Of course, in practice, that might only be feasible in the case of some contemporary miracles. But Keathley is asserting as a matter of principle ("by definition") that miracles can't be scientifically examined. Yet it's easy to come up with hypothetical (not to mention real) counterexamples.
ii) Also, how does a change in the laws of nature prevent us from empirically establishing the historicity of a given event? Is a miracle intrinsically undetectable to all five senses? Even if the cause is empirically indetectable, that doesn't make the effect indetectable. Surely Keathley believes many Biblical miracles were observable events. That our records go back to eyewitness testimony. So the scope of his claim is unclear.
If a historical account include one or more miracles, does Keathley think the historicity of the account in general can't be empirically established, or just the miraculous incidents embedded within the overall flow of recorded events?
As I noted before, presuppositionalism recognizes that all approaches to truth begin with certain assumptions that are taken on faith. However, there is one important caveat at this point. The presuppositionalist believes that the validity of one’s presuppositions must eventually be tested by using the laws of logic, and be demonstrated by a consistency with the evidential findings. Fideism, by contrast, does not believe one’s presuppositions can be tested. Like the presuppositionalist, the fideist believes that one starts with certain presuppositions. But unlike the presuppositionalist, the fideist does not subject his starting assumptions to any type of feedback or check. The fideist operates by “blind faith.”
That's a valid distinction. How he deploys it is a different question (see below).
The Only Recourse Left: The Omphalos Argument
Is that the only recourse left to YEC, or is that a supplemental argument?
As an OEC, isn't Keathley committed to selective mature creation? So, once again, isn't that a difference of degree rather than kind?
First, an appearance of age is an appearance of a non-actual history… If the original creatures were created fully grown, then they were created with an apparent history. By extension, a universe created fully mature will, by necessity, give signs of a history that did not actually happen.
Why is that a problem? Take a movie about the Gunfight at O.K. Corral. The movie set depicts the Old West, circa 1881. An instant past. Buildings look like they were in place well before October 1881. The appearance of a non-actual history.
Suppose the movie includes a period newspaper, dated Oct 25, 1881. The newspaper recounts some events from last month. Yet September 1881 doesn't exist in the movie. The newspaper gives signs of a history that didn't happen in the movie.
What if the divine origin of the world is like a historical drama which actually begins later than the past it takes for granted? I don't see how that's antecedently objectionable or improbable from a theological standpoint. Don't we need to leave our options open?
Second, the mature creation argument is unfalsifiable. This means it can be neither proven nor disproven. As Bertrand Russell observed, “We may all have come into existence five minutes ago, provided with ready-made memories, with holes in our socks and hair that needed cutting.”57 Since there is no way to prove the theory, we have moved from the realm of science into the realm of metaphysics. The mature creation argument truly is a fideistic position, since it places creation beyond investigation.
i) We need to distinguish between scientific theories and scientific presuppositions. Even if a scientific theory ought to be falsifiable (which is hotly contested in the philosophy of science), that doesn't mean a scientific presupposition is falsifiable. The existence of an external world is a scientific presupposition. But is that falsifiable? If idealism is true, then that's indistinguishable from a physical world.
ii) What if the truth happens to be unfalsifiable? Should we stipulate in advance that the truth must be falsifiable? But how do we know that? And if that's something we don't know and can't know, is it reasonable to make that a requirement of scientific theorizing?
iv) Isn't verification more fundamental than falsification? If something is verifiable, then falsification is superfluous. Perhaps Keathley thinks verification and falsification are linked. If so, we'd need to see the argument.
v) Suppose cyberneticists succeeded in developing artificial intelligence. But in the nature of the case, an artificially intelligent consciousness can't be a blank. The designer must give it something to start with. Software. A program. A self-identity.
Suppose the cyberneticist gives it memories. An imaginary past. What if that's necessary to kick-start AI consciousness?
What if, at some point, the AI machine came to realize that its original memories were simulated? But by that point it had acquired actual memories. An actual past. It no longer needed the ersatz memories.
Third, the appeal to an appearance of age is an admission that the evidence is against the young earth view. Gosse conceded this over 150 years ago.58 If the overwhelming preponderance of empirical data pointed to a recent creation, then YEC advocates would not bother with such a difficult hypothesis as the omphalos argument. The very fact that YEC proponents find it necessary to appeal to the mature creation argument is a concession.
I think it's more accurate to say YEC scientists believe the evidence is equivocal. That there's apparent scientific evidence for the antiquity of the world as well as scientific evidence for the recency of the world.
Fourth, the mature creation argument seems almost to embrace a denial of physical reality. Certain advocates of the argument do not hesitate to describe the universe as an illusion. Gary North declares, “The Bible’s account of the chronology of creation points to an illusion...The seeming age of the stars is an illusion...Either the constancy of the speed of light is an illusion, or the size of the universe is an illusion, or else the physical events that we hypothesize to explain the visible changes in light or radiation are false inferences.”59 At this point the arguments for the appearance of age seem uncomfortably Gnostic.
Does Keathley feel the same way about paintings? Painters often depict nonevents. They paint a scene that never happened. Is that "uncomfortably Gnostic"?
What if God is like an artist? Just as a painter can depict a scene which he saw in his imagination, why can't God create a physical image of a supernova which only exists in the mind of God?
Fifth, a consistent application of the mature creation argument will conclude that there are no evidences of a young earth. The universe has been coherently, uniformly created with the appearance of age.
I think that's an overgeneralization. Suppose God makes some fruit trees ex nihilo. These instant, first-generation fruit trees are undatable. They, in turn, disperse seeds which produce second (third, fourth, fifth) generation fruit trees. Because second-generation fruit trees are the product of a cyclical process, they are datable (e.g. tree rings, the lifecycle of fruit trees).
Sixth, Gosse arrived at the conclusion that we should study the earth as if it were old.
Why is that a problem? Suppose, for the sake of argument, that Adam had a heart defect. A cardiologist would treat him as if that was a congenital heart defect. Even though his heart defect is not an actual birth defect, its origin is irrelevant to the outcome or the treatment.
