Am I a YEC? Robert A. Herrmann Ph.D. 17 MAR 2012. Revised 14 OCT 2012. NO, I am not a classical YEC (Young Earth Creationist). However, I am continually accorded this title. Those that make this claim are not telling the truth. Each creationary process I discuss and each result they produce is an interpretation for symbols that appear within a mathematical structure. Hence, the statements are all rational relative to classical logic.
There are, of course, verifications in the meaning of the term YEC. The term YEC most often means that the Biblically described Earth prior to the Genesis Flood has been modified by the Flood and the result is the Earth of about 4,500 years ago. The YEC approach most often assumes that prior to and, especially, during the Flood physical laws as gleaned today or slight modifications in these laws have lead to the formations produced by the Flood. This modified Earth leads directly to the Earth of today. There are variations as to which laws are the same and which are not. Often, it is assumed that all physical laws after the Fall of Man are the same as those observed today. Some individuals assume that many physical laws, prior to Fall of Man, are also those we accept today. The same approach is applied to various creationary cosmologies. In general, I reject any approach to creationary science that it does not display the ture "power," higher-intelligence and miraculous aspect of the Creator's creationary activities. Many of the models presented today, do not do glorify God but rather glorify man.
Are my models built upon hypotheses that include the notions of a higher-intelligence and other higher-attributes? Again the answer is NO. My models are built upon mathematically modeling human mental processes. In particular, simple forms of human deduction, how we can order a collection of numbers or playing cards and the like, and human mental processes used to build objects from more elementary ones. Then these modeled processes are embedded inside a mathematical "structure," a specific mathematical theory. The theory predicts entities that can be interpreted as "higher-forms" of intelligence, higher-forms of ordering, higher-form of construction and "higher-attributes." Various restrictions of these "higher" forms of behavior lead to the corresponding aspects of human behavior. However, one needs to find these objects within the theory and determine their properties.
The model for all physical activity is the General Grand Unification Model (GGU-model). It is a cosmogony. The processes modeled produce universes. Indeed, infinitely many distinct universe, including each of the cosmologies that has been purposed by the secular scientific communities and those purposed by creationists. The "higher-attributes" model is based upon human attributes. The model used to investigate these higher-attributes is now called the GD-world model or simply the GD-world. No unobserved hypotheses are added.
Relative to the Bible, I am an absolute Bible literalist. If a particular Biblical word is not "obviously" to be taken as poetic or metaphorical in content, then I use the literal meaning of the word as understood at the time the word was first transcribe within the original autographs. This often requires considerable research. In this description for how God creates, we find that he "speaks" or "commands" entities to appear suddenly in mature and functional form. "And God said, 'Let there be . . . .' " The Hebrew for the verb "to say" is also translated as "to think." So, I use this translation in Genesis 1. "And God thought, 'Let there be. . . .' "
The GGU-model has a solution the predicts that all entities described during any of the six creation days will appear in mature and functional form. They will also continue to develop. For day-four, after the Sun and Moon and possibly other not specified local entities appear and at a specific moment in Earth time, a rapid formation process can produce any known cosmology so that each physical entity actually exists or existed. This all occurs during a zero-length Earth time interval. The rapid formation process stops at about 6,000 (Earth) years ago and this is when the "stars" appear relative to Earth observation. This displays God's extraordinary creationary power. The often ad hoc "star formation" cosmologies advocated by other members of the creationary science community I do not accept. I find them as totally unnecessary and not strongly founded upon literal Biblical meanings.
I accept that physical laws through the Fall of Man were not the same as today. This is obvious from the Biblical descriptions as to what transpired in Eden. Further, after the Fall, local environment physical laws were altered as Biblically implied. The GGU-model allows all of these alterations to occur. That is, physical laws for external universe are the same as observed today and those of Eden and even after the Fall were not those of any cosmologically produced Earth and its local environment. The reason for this is that physical laws do not generate any of these results. The development of physical entities simply satisfies such laws. The Bible tells us that the laws are necessary so that humankind can use them to, at least, subdue the animals. I believe that the Bible also implies that physical laws exist so that we can subdue the earth and, if necessary, its local environment.
I accept that there was a Genesis Flood and there appears to be material evidence for it. The Flood water was produced not just from water on or in the earth, but also water was produced supernaturally from the "crevices [narrow openings] of the heavens."
God stated that the Flood would destroy the "Earth" or "land." I accept that He did just this. I accept that the Flood water was a standard Biblical interface and, when the Ark settled on the land, the earth and local environment is actually a mingling of the Earth and local environment prior to the Flood with a cosmological produced earth and its local environment and this combination immediately had livable conditions. There is a great deal of evidence for this. But, it may take Holy Spirit guidance to determine what aspects of our present day earth and local environment is evidence for a highly modified pre-Flood world, evidence that reminds us "what we have lost." The physical laws we accept today would necessarily be those of the chosen cosmology.
Hence, I accept that our present day earth was physically realized a mere 4,500 years ago as one would measure a day by earth-rotation time. However, distinct from a pure YEC, I accept that the physical evidence displayed is composed of a mingling of modified originally created Earth and local environment with that of a cosmology produced "ancient" earth and local environment. Hence, relative to how "time" is measured, our present day earth and aspects of its local environment, with observable exceptions, exhibits great age. The observable exceptions is evidence that is better explained as developed come from the original Earth or its local environment.
For a more in-depth discussion and illustration of what I accept, please see this article and the three other "belief" articles that follow it.
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