So much for the Earth and the universe is between 6,000 and 10,000 years old

[Garin]

I am being sincere where there no rivers prior to the glaciers?

[Chadanth]

I am being sincere where there no rivers prior to the glaciers?

Of course there were, but not necessarily in the same places.

[Snowman]

I am being sincere where there no rivers prior to the glaciers?

Did you read my last post? Any existing rivers before that ice age were literally scraped off the face of the earth as the ice displaced any soft soils in it's path

[Dustin]

... an artistic rendering...

Posters created by Hippies aren't a reliable source. I know because I
was a Hippie.

How did you manage to quote me saying something I never said? Freeeeaky!

[Garin]

Did you read my last post? Any existing rivers before that ice age were literally scraped off the face of the earth as the ice displaced any soft soils in it's path

So The falls did exist millions of years ago or it didn't?

[Snowman]

So The falls did exist millions of years ago or it didn't?

It would have been a cliff millions of years ago, probably shorter, since the height difference is from unequal weathering of the rocks on the two sides

[Garin]

Niagara is only 167' tall. So if it erodes at the rate of a foot a year it shouldn't exist anymore

[Chadanth]

Niagara is only 167' tall. So if it erodes at the rate of a foot a year it shouldn't exist anymore

You're making the assumption that a geographic feature starts as x and linearly progresses to y. There are islands that formed literally overnight in the pacific, and had they continued at their instantaneous rate, they'd probably be some of the tallest mountains on earth.

[Chadanth]

Niagara is only 167' tall. So if it erodes at the rate of a foot a year it shouldn't exist anymore

Also, niagra erodes vertically and horizontally.

[Snowman]

I think you are confusing the direction they said it is eroding, it is moving the fall backward each year

[Garin]

If it's been around for let's just say 20000 years then it would exist

[Chadanth]

If it's been around for let's just say 20000 years then it would exist

Easily since the last ice age then.

[venture]

Well at least it is easy to spot who failed science class in grade school. Here I thought the whole ice age with glaciers making the Great Lakes was pretty common knowledge. Good thing this isn't...

[Oh GAWD the Smell!]

I just feel trolled.

[Chadanth]

It sort of ranks up there with Megyn "Jesus was a white guy" Kelly.

[hoya]

It sort of ranks up there with Megyn "Jesus was a white guy" Kelly.

She should just shut up and be hot.

[Garin]

Niagara should have eroded more than 8-10 miles in the last twenty thousand years though so none of this is making sense IMO. Claims have been made that prior to 100 years ago it was eroding as much as 3 feet per year but it has slowed down today to only a foot per year.

[ZYX2]

Niagara should have eroded more than 8-10 miles in the last twenty thousand years though so none of this is making sense IMO. Claims have been made that prior to 100 years ago it was eroding as much as 3 feet per year but it has slowed down today to only a foot per year.

That's assuming that all factors have remained relatively constant the past 20,000 years. Things change in that amount of time, often significantly.

[Just the facts]

So an all-powerful God (believed by many to have created everything in the universe) would have been incapable of building a waterfall on day 3?

[Garin]

"What Lyell wrote in Principles of Geology about what he saw on his trip to Niagara Falls was sufficient to satisfy the curiosity of most readers. But what he omitted would have undermined his age estimate to any alert reader. The old adage of ‘never let the facts spoil a good theory’ seems to apply here.

Lyell ignored the reports from Mr Blackwell that residents had observed the Falls recede by more than one metre (three feet) a year. At that rate the gorge would be less than 12,000 years old, which was in the ballpark of the biblical chronology, given the uncertainties in the estimates. That was not old enough for Lyell, who was looking to promote his slow-and-gradual geological theories. So he chose to disregard the data and conducted his own investigation of the residents.

A panoramic 1872 woodcut of Niagara Gorge
A panoramic 1872 woodcut of Niagara Gorge looking south from Lake Ontario to the Falls and Lake Erie in the distance.
Lyell does not explain how he did it, but strangely, he arrived at a reduced rate of 0.3 metres (one foot) a year. This ‘conjecture’, as he called it, much better suited his purpose. Since the gorge was 35,000 feet long, he concluded that it must be 35,000 years old!2 This estimate further undermined people’s confidence in the biblical chronology. And Lyell saw the Bible as the major obstacle to the general acceptance of his geological theories.

Lyell’s conclusion was wrong. Later analysis of eyewitness reports from 1842 to 1927 confirmed the high rate of erosion — 1.2 to 1.5 metres (four to five feet) a year.6 The residents of Lyell’s day had been conservative! This rate places an upper limit of 7,000 to 9,000 years for the gorge."

[Garin]

So you're suggesting that if we find something that is as old as the Bible says the earth is, then it is evidence for what? A god?



Let's say the falls are 8k years old (splitting the difference). How about everything else on the earth that is millions of years old? Are we allowed to look at that? Or do we just seek anecdotal stories and evidence that strictly make us feel better about our faith in an invisible man in the clouds?

Makes the case a little more believable for some. I already think that so its not for my benefit.

If they are wrong about the falls what makes you so confident they're not wrong about everything else? We're all born as children with faith so it is a natural aspect of life as you get older some choose to reject and some choose to embrace. This world and everything on it including humans is proof enough to me that it was created and didn't just happen by chance.

[Garin]

Assumptions in dating method

"Unlike historical dating, which depends on direct observation, all ‘scientific’ dating methods rely on assumptions about what happened in the past. Without such assumptions, no age can be calculated. No matter how reasonable these assumptions may seem, we can never be certain they are true unless we have eyewitnesses for the entire time period in question.

We know that the assumptions Lyell made were wrong, because he ended up with a greatly inflated age that did not agree with the Bible. Indeed, his exaggerated 35,000-year age has long been abandoned, even in the geological literature, which now quotes 12,000 years for the age of the gorge — still much older than the Bible allows. But even this age is not based on the best estimates for the erosion rate of the Niagara River. These would still give an age that was ‘too young’. Rather, the 12,000 years is based on radiocarbon dating of a piece of wood from St David’s Gorge. Readers of Creation will already know how inaccurate radiometric dating is!7 Radiocarbon dates are too old because the past effects of Noah’s Flood on the earth’s carbon balance are ignored.8 When these effects are properly included, the radiocarbon age agrees with the Bible.

Interestingly, rather than supporting Lyell’s concept of an old earth, Niagara Gorge provides wonderful consistency with the biblical time-scale. When all the factors that affect erosion are considered, the calculated age agrees quite nicely with the gorge forming since the ice cover retreated about 3,800 years ago, after the post-Flood Ice Age"

[onthestrip]

Assumptions in dating method

"Unlike historical dating, which depends on direct observation, all ‘scientific’ dating methods rely on assumptions about what happened in the past. Without such assumptions, no age can be calculated. No matter how reasonable these assumptions may seem, we can never be certain they are true unless we have eyewitnesses for the entire time period in question.

We know that the assumptions Lyell made were wrong, because he ended up with a greatly inflated age that did not agree with the Bible. Indeed, his exaggerated 35,000-year age has long been abandoned, even in the geological literature, which now quotes 12,000 years for the age of the gorge — still much older than the Bible allows. But even this age is not based on the best estimates for the erosion rate of the Niagara River. These would still give an age that was ‘too young’. Rather, the 12,000 years is based on radiocarbon dating of a piece of wood from St David’s Gorge. Readers of Creation will already know how inaccurate radiometric dating is!7 Radiocarbon dates are too old because the past effects of Noah’s Flood on the earth’s carbon balance are ignored.8 When these effects are properly included, the radiocarbon age agrees with the Bible.

Interestingly, rather than supporting Lyell’s concept of an old earth, Niagara Gorge provides wonderful consistency with the biblical time-scale. When all the factors that affect erosion are considered, the calculated age agrees quite nicely with the gorge forming since the ice cover retreated about 3,800 years ago, after the post-Flood Ice Age"

Aye yai yai...

And you wont believe accepted scientific methods but you take as fact that the earth was once completely flooded because an old book says so...? Do you not see a problem with how you come about these decisions?

[hoya]

I can believe that the Earth was created by an all-powerful being. I can also believe that it was done so in a rational manner. Finally I can believe that the Biblical account of how the Earth was created was written allegorically, rather than scientifically.

[Oh GAWD the Smell!]

And I can believe unicorn farts are what have kept the falls from eroding more than they have...And I can point to the abundance of horses in Montana to prove it.

Makes just as much sense.