Young Earth

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Is the Earth only thousands of years old?

The Earth is thousands of years old

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The Earth is billions of years old, and God created it

So, it seems to me that essentially, OEC and YEC effectively disprove each other. I agree with the YEC's that a young Earth is what one would expect from reading Genesis. And I agree with OEC's that the evidence for an old-Earth is just too strong. So, as I said, they effectively disprove each other.

Very recently, I decided to read Richard Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker. And while I know that I'm not really qualified to present an intellectual defense of Dawkins, I can say that his work did appear to me to be more credible than the Creationist works I have read. His arguments seemed to me to fit the observational model much better. Creationism now seems to me to be completely inconsistent with the the observational evidence.

Evolution vs. Creationism from Case Against Faith  Paul Jacobsen

...If there was only one single form of evidence regarding the age of the Earth and the universe, then it might well be reasonable to consider the possibility it is wrong. However, there are many different forms of evidence. There is the cosmological evidence of light from stars billions of light-years away. There is archeological evidence. There is radiometric evidence. Sometimes Young-Earth proponents argue that archeologists assume that cosmologists are correct, and cosmologists assume archeologists are correct. And so, the theory goes, the evidence for an ancient Earth and universe is nothing but a massive case of flawed circular reasoning.

Commentary on Hugh Ross's Creation and Time: A Report on the Progressive Creationist Book from Case Against Faith  Mark Van Bebber and Paul S. Taylor

The Earth is billions of years old and had no divine origin

As far as evolution vs. Creationism, first I can certainly agree that life is extraordinarily complex. And I can see how someone could think it impossible to evolve. However, if we didn't evolve. then God went to extraordinary effort to make it LOOK LIKE we did. Ross is an ardent old-Earther; meaning he believes the universe is in fact billions of years old as most scientists believe. So in Ross' theology, God seems to have spent billions of years creating billions of life forms in a 15 billion year prelude to a little Garden of Eden for man. And for what, so we can go, 'gee, look at those neat fossils!'? What’s with this ridiculous prelude? Ironically, Ross even claims that the Bible shows that God generally doesn’t create more than He needs to fulfill His purposes. This 15 billion year prelude doesn’t count?

Commentary on Hugh Ross's Creation and Time: A Biblical and Scientific Perspective on the Creation-Date Controversy from Case Against Faith  Paul Jacobsen