Hi Janice

Thank you for your very thorough comments (most of which I understood, although some of the specific scientific examples were beyond my ken).  What you say about the different types of science makes a lot of sense.

I think your last paragraph goes at least some of the way towards what I was saying, which is that different types of ‘science’ produce results of varying reliability.  As your own example shows, empirical science can produce flawed results.  And in the end, such sciences tell us that: “whenever ‘A’ happens, with ‘B’ parameters, we have got ‘C’ results - and so we have an expectation that if we repeat A with B again we will get C; but if we get D we’ll have to revise our theory” (yes, this is incredibly simplified, but I’m sure you see the point).  So (to avoid the word ‘valid’ which you fairly criticised) various classes of science can produce results of varying quality depending on a number of variables!

To use a different comparison, there are some results of historic research in which we have a very high degree of confidence - others of which we are much less certain.  The same is true with regard to the findings of empirical sciences.  I’m simply wanting to avoid the error of elevating the empirical sciences over other kinds of science.  Your comments seem to indicate that you are not making such an error.

Bob

Bob said:

Others (e.g., Dannii) who have a high view of Scripture have taken a particular view of what Genesis 1 means, and therefore reject the results of scientific research (or they might prefer, the claims of some in the scientific community) where they conflict with that meaning.  I’m much closer to this position, in that I hold to the same view of the authority of Scripture.

But I have found myself more closely aligned on this particular issue to Owen and others, because I am not yet convinced of the exegesis of Genesis 1 which insists on a 6 x 24hr creation.  This is, I think, where Dave L is coming from as well.  For me it is an exegetical question, which has also been the subject of another thread (which I can’t find now) on the relationship between Genesis 1 and 2.  Just how do we understand Genesis 1 as literature?

I too feel myself moving a little toward Dave L’s position, but only somewhat. I think that he and others and now convinced me that the primary purpose of Gen 1-2 isn’t history, but I don’t think a secondary or tertiary purpose has been ruled out.