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I often see people trying to pass off the books of Genesis,
from the bible, as being close enough to scientific knowledge that it's
worthy of being considered true advice from some god or other which got a
bit mixed up in the reading.
First of
all, the christian myth of Genesis is but a carbon copy of one of many
earlier religions. Like pretty much all of christianity, it's been borrowed
from somewhere else, twisted a little to make it look original, bound up in
one complete bit - with the inconsistent bits left out - and handed out at
schools and missions throughout the world.
Both
christianity's and judaism's bibles start like this:
| 1:1 |
In the beginning God created heaven
and earth. |
| 1:2 |
The earth was without form and
empty, with darkness on the face of the depths, but God's spirit
moved on the water's surface. |
| 1:3 |
God said, 'There shall be light,'
and light came into existence. |
| 1:4 |
God saw that the light was good,
and God divided between the light and the darkness. |
| 1:5 |
God named the light
'Day,' and the darkness He named 'Night.' It was evening and it was
morning, one day. Ok, a god created it all.
You could start out and say that's the big bang. Everything has to
start somewhere, so there's no real trick involved here. Every
religion and tribal story ever has a starting point, so let's see
how we go from there.
The first issue for biblical accuracy is at 1.2.
Being without form and empty is a great start,
because that could easily describe the dust cloud which earth is
presumed to have formed from.
However, the waters didn't form until much, much
later, and the light predated the earth by some billions of years,
so, not even close. The dividing of light into darkness is the first
real clue that the story is made up and not of divine origin.
There is division between light and dark, the
earth just rotates on its axis. This is obviously a naive effort to
use what little human knowledge existed to give some kind of
rational explanation - and it's so wrong that it cannot be
considered as having any outside knowledge.
Biblical astrophysics = fail |
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The Second Day
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| 1:6 |
God said, 'There shall be a sky in
the middle of the water, and it shall divide between water and
water.' |
| 1:7 |
God [thus] made the sky, and it
separated the water below the sky from the water above the sky. It
remained that way. |
| 1:8 |
God named the sky 'Heaven.' It was
evening and it was morning, a second day. A
sky in the middle of the water?
So the water and sky were mixed up? Did gravity
not exist then? Very strange, and if someone's able to advise me how
that is anything like any kind of reality, I'd love an explanation.
Rain clouds won't work as they are not in any way "above the sky".
Biblical meteorology = fail |
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The Third Day
|
| 1:9 |
God said, 'The waters under the
heaven shall be gathered to one place, and dry land shall be seen.'
It happened. |
| 1:10 |
God named the dry land 'Earth,' and
the gatherings of water, He named 'Seas.' God saw that it was good. |
| 1:11 |
God said, 'The earth shall send
forth vegetation. Seed bearing plants and fruit trees that produce
their own kinds of fruits with seeds shall be on the earth.' It
happened. |
| 1:12 |
The earth sent forth vegetation,
plants bearing their own kinds of seeds, and trees producing fruits
containing their own kinds of seeds. God saw that it was good. |
| 1:13 |
It was evening and it was morning,
a third day. The land and water separating
is not too bad, but there's some awful chronology on the way!
Seed bearing plants didn't appear until after all
forms of animals aside from mammals had arisen.
Again, the bible's explanation is clearly a naive
attempt to explain something rationally - animals are far more
complicated than plants, so plants must have arisen first. Alas,
scientific evidence is complete and shows that the first flowering
plants did not arrive until well after the dinosaurs.
Even if you want to be pedantic and claim
"seed-bearing" plants such as conifers, you'd better be ready to eat
one to show that point. And even they originated only ~340 mya, far
less time than many different animal types.
Biblical botany = fail. |
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The Fourth Day
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| 1:14 |
God said, 'There shall be lights in
the heavenly sky to divide between day and night. They shall serve
as omens [and define] festivals, days and years. |
| 1:15 |
They shall be lights in the
heavenly sky, to shine on the earth.' It happened. |
| 1:16 |
God [thus] made the two large
lights, the greater light to rule the day, and the smaller light to
rule the night. [He also made] the stars. |
| 1:17 |
God placed them in the heavenly sky
to shine on the earth, |
| 1:18 |
to rule by day and by night, and to
divide between the light and the darkness. God saw that it was good. |
| 1:19 |
It was evening and it was morning,
a fourth day. Again, we see a clear miss by
the biblical scholars.
It shows that those biblical scholars had been
smart enough to figure that the stars conformed to patterns, and
that within the patterns there were daily and annual movements, in
accordance with the seasons. Then, they confirm it for us by again
placing the earth at the centre.
Biblical astronomy = fail |
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The Fifth Day
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| 1:20 |
God said, 'The water shall teem
with swarms of living creatures. Flying creatures shall fly over the
land, on the face of the heavenly sky.' |
| 1:21 |
God [thus] created the great sea
monsters, along with every particular species of living thing that
crawls, with which the waters teem, and every particular species of
winged flying creature. God saw that it was good. |
| 1:22 |
God blessed them, saying, 'Be
fruitful and become many, and fill the waters of the seas. Let the
flying creatures multiply on the land.' |
| 1:23 |
It was evening and it was morning,
a fifth day. Another naive and obvious attempt
to categorise animals and plants.
Mammals are smarter than everything else, so must
have been created last.
Alas, mammals pre-date birds by many millions of
years.
Biblical palaeontology = fail |
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The Sixth Day
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| 1:24 |
God said, 'The earth shall bring
forth particular species of living creatures, particular species of
livestock, land animals, and beasts of the earth.' It happened. |
| 1:25 |
God [thus] made particular species
of beasts of the earth, particular species of livestock, and
particular species of animals that walk the land. God saw that it
was good. |
| 1:26 |
God said, 'Let us make man with
our image and likeness. Let him dominate the fish of the sea,
the birds of the sky, the livestock animals, and all the earth - and
every land animal that walks the earth.' |
| 1:27 |
God [thus] created man with His
image. In the image of God, He created him, male and female He
created them. |
| 1:28 |
God blessed them. God said to them,
'Be fertile and become many. Fill the land and conquer it.
Dominate the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every beast
that walks the land. |
| 1:29 |
God said, 'Behold, I have given you
every seed bearing plant on the face of the earth, and every tree
that has seed bearing fruit. It shall be to you for food. |
| 1:30 |
For every beast of the field, every
bird of the sky, and everything that walks the land, that has in it
a living soul, all plant vegetation shall be food.' It remained that
way. |
| 1:31 |
God saw all that he had made, and
behold, it was very good. It was evening and it was morning, the
sixth day. Biblical empathy = fail |
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