Adam,Adam_777 wrote:Without any outside information this little fellow could easily be mistaken as older based on the physical data:
Is God doing a sneaky trick because evidences could misconstrue old ages falsely? Should we reject the evidence for a young age here because they are mostly based off of nonphysical evidences like hospital records and parent/friend testimony or should we look for potential reasons for the potential false appearance of age in spite of the apparent physical appearance of age?
If we just had the Body, a birth certificate, and one person's testimony would the physical data drive how we interpret the birth certificate and testimony. Which one has more merit? Maybe a number is off on the birth certificate. Maybe the person testifying is not being literal since the body obviously looks older then what the certificate and person's testimony declare.
Should we look strictly at how we interpret the non-physical testimonies to line up with the obvious appearance of age or should we also question to see; if the obvious appearance of age... is indeed so conclusive as to merit how we view all other data?
Please don't take this personally, as I'm looking to address the substance of what you're saying and not you personally.
This type of argument is one of the things that once I came to understand what the dynamics were, drove me from the popular YEC camp.
This is what in logic is referred to as a category error and it is rhetorically very effective but for anyone who examines it, the appeal seeks to compare visual misperception in the age of a person in the most unique and extreme instance and then to compare that to the common perceptions of the age of the earth. It compares biology to geology. It seeks to create doubt in the mind of the hearer and then answer that doubt with an appeal to an already assumed answer. It's a rhetorical trick masquerading as science and logic.
The difference in age appearance that is being appealed to in this little rhetorical flourish is not a case of a 10 year old boy appearing to be be 80. The appearance being appealed to in this instance is subjective and on the basis on the documentation you reference can be easily corrected. The difference between the perceived age and real age is about 800%.
The difference in age appearance between a YEC and OEC position today is the case of an earth that from the YEC perspective is 6,000 years old (roughly although some will accept up to 10,000) and (although technically an OEC position isn't bound by current scientific definitions) an earth that appears to be roughly 5 billion years old. The difference in this comparison between perceived age and presumed age (which ironically is moving in the opposite direction) is 0.0000012%. Invert it and you're talking about 833,333% if the comparison is to be accepted at face value.
YEC, as you're presenting it, isn't being based on an examination of the evidence objectively observed and presented. It's appealing on the basis of a flawed logical appeal to doubt, based upon a category error and confusion of the things being compared to create doubt for which the implied solution is the assumption already made by the presenter.
Sadly, my experience and observation with many (not all) YEC proponents in this regard when having this pointed out will be to attempt to defend by introducing more confusion and rhetoric or an unwillingness to concede the point and a move on to the next appeal. It's a static argument. There's rarely a willingness to concede any point and the arsenal is returned to in a seemingly infinite cycle of doubt with the same answer provided.
Then the appeal is back to the Scriptures and what I believe is a flawed hermeneutical approach, which then becomes equated to the Scriptures itself and those who disagree are implied to be or overtly called heretics.
I'm extending things from your presentation here, so again let me be clear that I hope you're not taking this personally but rather hearing the frustration that this type of fallacious presentation engenders not only in the small sector of Christians who are OEC but moreso in those outside of Christianity who are then presented with the proposition that the only way to be a Christian is to commit intellectual suicide and knowingly accept this type of irrational reasoning to a presupposed conclusion.
For the sake of discussion, before you move onto the next presentation, would you please deal point by point with the questions and points I've provided you above and explain to me why this is not a logical fallacy or catergory error or if you accept that it to any degree that it is, why you would appeal to it in this manner.
blessings.
bart
