Ages according to the Bible

[madscientist]

Well... that has been also discussed - whether there was death prior to the Fall. Some say no human death, but some suggest there was animal death before - as animals were given names according to their behavior etc. And how would animals feed themselves?
Next, dinosaurs were extinct before the first man came - so there was, yes, death before man even came! Not talking before the fall!
But maybe fauna and flora were healthier. Less parasites, harmful bacteria and all that? But yes it could be true that the world was healthier or would have been. The paradox is, however, that although man were to be immortal, not a single man managed this. And what was this immortality? How would we be? Be born an adult and never change, grow old, age, never be a child or an old man? Sounds cool but don't know how it would run. Or maybe the immortality God meant was the spiritual immortality - think this has also been discussed on some other thread. Or - how long did Adam and Eve live before the fall? He was 930 years i think (if i remember well) when he died but was this from fall onwards or from his birth?
The biological systems could have simply changed - no doubt. But if human has been here for such a tiny fraction of all time, and we know there was death and species disappearing prior to his existence, can we truly say how the world was running before? maybe not...

[Marcosll]

Ages has been a personal favourite topic of mine for a long time.

1) We know that animals lived longer up until very recently.
Example: Turtles. Turtles can live to be hundreds of years old. A 250 year old turtle is the oldest recorded in human archives, however, turtles the size of cars used to be common (we have documented evidence of this). We have some very old trees as well. The fact is that nowadays things don't live as long for some reason.

It's safe to assume that lifespans of creatures change over time. Reptiles were bigger in the past because they lived longer, a lot , lot longer.


If a turtle recently could live 250 years what evidence do we have that humans, thousands of years ago, couldn't have lives as long or longer?

2) We know atmospheric conditions have changed. Amospheric conditions might have something to do with how old things get.

3) We cannot assume gravity has been constant. Gravity might affect size and age. It's not scientific to assume the gravitational constant of the earth has been the same over time. The earth's mass might have increased signifcantly as it sucked in stuff from space (comets, meteors etc).

4) Rotation speed of the earth. We do not know for certain that the earth has been rotating at the same speed nor that it has been circling the sun at the same speed. Lenght of days and years might have changed.

5) Distance from the sun of the earth. We cannot be certain the earth today is at the same distance from the sun as a few thousand years ago, let alone millions of years ago.

6) Intensity of the Sun. We know stars have lifespans and change intensities and masses. We don't have enough data to be certain the Sun hasn't undergone changes in "recent" history.

If you consider all these things that directly affect life on our planet, it would be ignorant to assume that things live as long today as they did 5000, 50,000 or even 500,000 years ago.

[madscientist]

Interesting Marcosll... yeah it has been mentioned somewhere though... that things have changed.
But does it need to apply to all species necessarily? And so if it did... then it could suggest that there were some changes.
I also read somewhere it could be by some eruption of some star nearby that caused all the radiation... and that is what could have caused that. But as for the speed of rotation, length of day etc - i think those remained more or less constant for the past few thousands of years. maybe not millions however - but then would not the Earth have fallen in or something? i think the Solar system must be pretty stable constantly in order to enable us life here - to keep things as they are. And now another question - what caused the planets to start orbiting around the Sun? What was the initial force? I think it is as intriguing to ask how we were created! Either evolution - random movement of particles until it all came down, or some other inteligent being put it there! I.e. God.
However, there would still be death and suffering... maybe less, longer lifespans etc but death was there. And then... immortality - what type was it of?

[Micmac]

Mmmmm...lets see, here's my explanation/interpretation.

In the beginning we were created after GOD's image and likeness, does this mean we initially were more spiritual than physical (sort of super human)? Maybe our punishment for sinning in the beginning was losing our "super human" abilities over thousands of years, I don't think it went from living for 900 years to 100 in one day! I think it was a gradual decline.

Maybe the mentioning of the days will be short in Revelations means a short lifespan? (60 - 70 years from an initial 900 odd?)

Cheers
Micmac

[dayage]

I believe the ages in Genesis 5 and 11 are real. There are gaps in the genealogies, so they can not be added up. One example is in Luke 3:36 (Cainan) see Gen. 11:12.

Adam and Eve could have become immortal if they had eaten from the Tree of Life.

Marcosll,

1) Reptiles living during the time of humans quit living so long because we like to kill them. Trees that are almost 5,000 years old and still living show that certain life forms can live a long time, but we like to cut old trees down.

3) Just how much change are you talking about? Gravity itself is a constant of physics.

4) The earth's rotation has changed. About 3.8 billion years ago a day was 4 hours long.

5) The earth's distance from the sun may have when the Mars sized object (which formed the moon) hit earth.

6) The sun has gotten brighter over time. 4 billion years ago it was only about 75% of its current brightness. It has be stable for about 50,000 yrs.