Young earth creationists and the big bang

[crazydavy]

To start off, I am an agnostic, not a Christian (long story - ask me the details if you want), so I don't really have a theological axe to grind in asking this question.

I have noticed that many Young Earth Creationists (YEC's) are critical of the Big Bang because they believe that it's at odds with the biblical story of creation. A notable YEC critic of the Big Bang is Russell Humphreys who proposes an alternative cosmological model of his own. Though I am a layman when it comes to science, from what I understand of his proposal it seems to me that Humphreys is not actually denying the basic framework of the Big Bang, namely, the evidence for the origin and expansion of the universe from an initial singularity. What he is denying is the standard Big Bang cosmological model and the details and assumptions that accompany it. I assume this is true of other YEC's as well.

Am I reading Humphreys and the other YEC's correctly on this point?

Thanks,

Dave

[Felgar]

To start off, I am an agnostic, not a Christian (long story - ask me the details if you want), so I don't really have a theological axe to grind in asking this question.

I have noticed that many Young Earth Creationists (YEC's) are critical of the Big Bang because they believe that it's at odds with the biblical story of creation. A notable YEC critic of the Big Bang is Russell Humphreys who proposes an alternative cosmological model of his own. Though I am a layman when it comes to science, from what I understand of his proposal it seems to me that Humphreys is not actually denying the basic framework of the Big Bang, namely, the evidence for the origin and expansion of the universe from an initial singularity. What he is denying is the standard Big Bang cosmological model and the details and assumptions that accompany it. I assume this is true of other YEC's as well.

Am I reading Humphreys and the other YEC's correctly on this point?

Thanks,

Dave

I don't think a generalization can hold in such a large area. There are YEC's who reconcile with the Big Bang via the relative nature of time (i.e. From God's point of view it DID only take 6 days to create the universe). There are those who propose entirely different models, because the origin of the universe from a single point is by no means proven, though the evidence is growing. And there are YEC's who think less techinically, and just trust that "God made it", because in the end they are much more interested and concerned with the tangible effects of God working in the lives of those who love Him than in some scientific explanation of creation.

So the short answer to your question is that you can't generalize all YEC theory in that way; each needs to be addressed on its own.

[crazydavy]

Thanks for your reply. My main concern in the post was with YEC's who work with scientific models of some sort, not necessarily every YEC. Of course I would not expect every one to agree even on the general outline, but I wonder if most do.