Bruce Sterling - Essays. FSF Columns

fifth verse. This suggests that there may have been an immense

span of time, perhaps eons, between the creation of matter and life,

and the beginning of the day-night cycle. Perhaps there were

multiple creations and cataclysms during this period, accounting for

the presence of oddities such as trilobites and dinosaurs, before a

standard six-day Edenic "restoration" around 4,000 BC.

"Gap theory" was favored by Biblical scholar Charles Scofield,

prominent '30s barnstorming evangelist Harry Rimmer, and well-

known modern televangelist Jimmy Swaggart, among others.

The second method of reconciliation is "day-age theory." In

this interpretation, the individual "days" of the Bible are considered

not modern twenty-four hour days, but enormous spans of time.

Day-age theorists point out that the sun was not created until Day 4,

more than halfway through the process. It's difficult to understand

how or why the Earth would have a contemporary 24-hour "day"

without a Sun. The Beginning, therefore, likely took place eons ago,

with matter created on the first "day," life emerging on the third

"day," the fossil record forming during the eons of "days" four five

and six. Humanity, however, was created directly by divine fiat and

did not "evolve" from lesser animals.

Perhaps the best-known "day-age" theorist was William

Jennings Bryan, three-times US presidential candidate and a

prominent figure in the Scopes evolution trial in 1925.

In modern creation-science, however, both gap theory and

day-age theory are in eclipse, supplanted and dominated by "flood

geology." The most vigorous and influential creation-scientists

today are flood geologists, and their views (though not the only

views in creationist doctrine), have become synonymous with the

terms "creation science" and "scientific creationism."

"Flood geology" suggests that this planet is somewhere between

6,000 and 15,000 years old. The Earth was entirely lifeless until the

six literal 24-hour days that created Eden and Adam and Eve. Adam

and Eve were the direct ancestors of all human beings. All fossils,

including so-called pre-human fossils, were created about 3,000 BC

during Noah's Flood, which submerged the entire surface of the Earth

and destroyed all air-breathing life that was not in the Ark (with the

possible exception of air-breathing mammalian sea life). Dinosaurs,

which did exist but are probably badly misinterpreted by geologists,

are only slightly older than the human race and were co-existent

with the patriarchs of the Old Testament. Actually, the Biblical

patriarchs were contemporaries with all the creatures in the fossil

record, including trilobites, pterosaurs, giant ferns, nine-foot sea

scorpions, dragonflies two feet across, tyrannosaurs, and so forth.

The world before the Deluge had a very rich ecology.

Modern flood geology creation-science is a stern and radical

school. Its advocates have not hesitated to carry the war to their

theological rivals. The best known creation-science text (among

hundreds) is probably *The Genesis Flood: The Biblical Record and

its Scientific Implications* by John C. Whitcomb and Henry M.

Morris (1961). Much of this book's argumentative energy is devoted

to demolishing gap theory, and especially, the more popular and

therefore more pernicious day-age theory.

Whitcomb and Morris point out with devastating logic that

plants, created on Day Three, could hardly have been expected to

survive for "eons" without any daylight from the Sun, created on Day

Four. Nor could plants pollinate without bees, moths and butterflies

-- winged creatures that were products of Day Five.

Whitcomb and Morris marshal a great deal of internal Biblical

testimony for the everyday, non-metaphorical, entirely real-life

existence of Adam, Eve, Eden, and Noah's Flood. Jesus Christ Himself

refers to the reality of the Flood in Luke 17, and to the reality of

Adam, Eve, and Eden in Matthew 19.

Creationists have pointed out that without Adam, there is no

Fall; with no Fall, there is no Atonement for original sin; without

Atonement, there can be no Savior. To lack faith in the historical

existence and the crucial role of Adam, therefore, is necessarily to

lack faith in the historical existence and the crucial role of Jesus.

Taken on its own terms, this is a difficult piece of reasoning to refute,

and is typical of Creation-Science analysis.

To these creation-scientists, the Bible is very much all of a

piece. To begin pridefully picking and choosing within God's Word

about what one may or may not choose to believe is to risk an utter

collapse of faith that can only result in apostasy -- "going to the

apes." These scholars are utterly and soberly determined to believe

every word of the Bible, and to use their considerable intelligence to

prove that it is the literal truth about our world and our history as a

species.

Cynics might wonder if this activity were some kind of

elaborate joke, or perhaps a wicked attempt by clever men to garner

money and fame at the expense of gullible fundamentalist

supporters. Any serious study of the lives of prominent Creationists

establishes that this is simply not so. Creation scientists are not

poseurs or hypocrites. Many have spent many patient decades in

quite humble circumstances, often enduring public ridicule, yet still

working selflessly and doggedly in the service of their beliefs.

When they state, for instance, that evolution is inspired by Satan and

leads to pornography, homosexuality, and abortion, they are entirely

in earnest. They are describing what they consider to be clear and

evident facts of life.

Creation-science is not standard, orthodox, respectable science.

There is, and always has been, a lot of debate about what qualities an

orthodox and respectable scientific effort should possess. It can be

stated though that science should have at least two basic

requirements: (A) the scientist should be willing to follow the data

where it leads, rather than bending the evidence to fit some

preconceived rationale, and (B) explanations of phenomena should

not depend on unique or nonmaterial factors. It also helps a lot if

one's theories are falsifiable, reproducible by other researchers,

openly published and openly testable, and free of obvious internal

contradictions.

Creation-science does not fit that description at all. Creation-

science considers it sheer boneheaded prejudice to eliminate

miraculous, unique explanations of world events. After all, God, a

living and omnipotent Supreme Being, is perfectly capable of

directing mere human affairs into any direction He might please. To

simply eliminate divine intervention as an explanation for

phenomena, merely in order to suit the intellectual convenience of

mortal human beings, is not only arrogant and arbitrary, but absurd.

Science has accomplished great triumphs through the use of

purely naturalistic explanations. Over many centuries, hundreds of

scientists have realized that some questions can be successfully

investigated using naturalistic techniques. Questions that cannot be

answered in this way are not science, but instead are philosophy, art,

or theology. Scientists assume as a given that we live in a natural

universe that obeys natural laws.

It's conceivable that this assumption might not be the case.

The entire cognitive structure of science hinges on this assumption of