The video shows presenter Richard Smith driving a vehicle across outback Australia, which he uses as an analogy of geologic time. It’s a powerful way of teaching the secular 4.5-billion-year evolutionary story, using fun ideas and cool graphics.
Smith imagines that, at the press of a button, his car turns into a time machine. Presto, he is suddenly zipping into the past at a million years a minute. What an imagination.
Of course, there is no such thing as a time machine. Everyone knows that. But most people do not know that there is no scientific instrument that can measure time into the past. (See The fatal flaw with radioactive dating.)
Dr Albert Mohler, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in the USA, described evolution over millions of years as the “creation myth of the secular elites”. He calls it the “Great intellectual rival to Christianity in the Western World”.
A myth is a story without historical evidence. That is what Smith is telling—the secular myth. For those who need to be convinced of this, ask yourself questions as you watch the video. Whenever Smith makes a claim in the video, e.g. about human evolution, or dinosaurs, or how the earth formed, ask yourself: “Who saw that happen?” “What evidence do they have for that?” “Where were they standing when that occurred?”
Science is about evidence. So is history. But nobody saw the events that Smith describes. He is presenting the great Western myth of our time. Yet the video is described as “documentary/factual” on the ABC site.
So, how do we know what happened in the past?
We rely on witnesses who were present. We depend on their writings.
That is how we know the dates and details of the Battle of Waterloo. That is how we know about Julius Caesar. We have historical evidence. We have documents. That is how we know there was a global Flood at the time of Noah. That is how we know when it happened, how long it took, how high the water went and other significant details.
Dr Smith does not believe the testimony of these eyewitnesses concerning the global Flood, so he can only resort to speculation. This is how he and others in the West have come up with their own imaginative story.
Interestingly, when Richard Smith speaks about what happened in the past, when he supposedly drives backward in time, he is actually driving through country that preserves the devastation caused by Noah’s Flood. When they show us the landscapes we are looking at country fashioned by the receding waters of the Flood. When he talks about dinosaurs roaming the land, he is referring to the remains of these once-magnificent animals that were overwhelmed as the floodwaters approached their peak. When he shows the sea pens of the Ediacaran of South Australia he is referring to organisms buried much earlier in the Flood catastrophe. This is what we can truly call a “mind altering”, to quote the ABC, way of looking at the world.
So, the same evidence can be used to support different stories, but only one can be true. The biblical account is a story based, not on a time machine, which does not exist, but on the eyewitness testimony of people who recorded events that happened, so we would appreciate our place in this world. And that has implications for a lot of issues currently under debate in our country. The ABC, a publically funded institution, should provide balance, especially since our understanding of the past has such significance for the worldview battles in the present in our culture.
Darren
“But nobody saw the events that Smith describes.”
They use fossils, dude, which is part of the science of paleontology. The equivalent in history is archeology. There are many historical events for which there are no eye-witness accounts at the time, and history relies on archeology to develop an understanding.
While archeology has done much to demonstrate the belief in god, there’s no archeology as yet proving the existence of god. Likewise, as far as I know, there are no known fossils proving the existence of god as the Christians undestand the notion of god.
The only way an understaning of these geological periods as connect to Noah’s Flood could be understood to be mind altering and insightful is if you were on some kind of mind altering substance.
Tas Walker replies:
Yes, Darren, of course there are fossils. We know about those. But how you interpret the fossils depends on your assumptions about the past. I’d encourage you to read more articles on this site and the q&a topics on creation.com.
Jen
Wow. What an odd interpretation of scientific evidence. Personally, I would much prefer my tax dollars go to amazingly informative programmes like ‘Aust: The Time Traveller’s Guide than to Christian-biased RE in public schools. The Flood indeed.
Tas Walker responds:
Hi Jen, That is just your opinion. There are other opinions. And you are not the only person who pays tax. Other people want to see their views given a fair airing. And they want Christian based RE for their children (which is taught by volounteers, not by government paid teachers, unlike the religion of evolution). Kids have a choice in sport. Why should you think you have a right to force your preferences on everyone?
Trevor
The flood you say however, if that was true why are the different levels of layers in mountain tops? Why arnt the same fossils found around the same layers of rock in different places?? The bible doesn’t even mention Australia it says we should kill gays and kill females who are not vigins when they marry yet are forced to marry if they have been raped? If you know better please tell your story in a better way than prof Richard smith the man who is a legend doing the long awaited documentrys of our country.
Tas Walker responds:
Hi Trevor, Keep reading the articles.
Kirsty
“Why should you think you have a right to force your preferences on everyone?”
… Um, well for one, I am A TAX PAYING AUSTRALIAN CITIZEN and this is a US website. So I suggest you mind your own business… and that is MY opinion.
You are also mistaking scientific fact for ‘opinion’.
You will also find that the vast, vast majority of Australians do NOT want “Christian based RE for their children”. Once again, you are making assumptions based on the level of religiosity in YOUR country – not mine. Well, guess what? We’re not American.
Australia is a far more secular nation than the US, and we place value on scientific evidence and debate… not on the unfounded beliefs of closeted, uneducated nutcases.
And finally, there is such a thing as HISTORY (i.e. based on written documentation) and PREHISTORY (i.e. before the written word). Or are you suggesting that we take Bronze Age writings as a guide to understanding geological and biological phenomena from hundreds of millions of years ago? Of course you are.
But then… I suppose the planet is only six thousand years old, isn’t it?? Sheesh. There is no point arguing with people so utterly and willfully ignorant.
And as for your genius question of how the Earth formed: “Who saw that happen?””… [Face palm]. Well, considering modern humans (Homo sapiens) have only been around for a species for 200,000 years, and the planet is ~4.6 BILLION years old – there is your answer.
Oh, and by the way, radioactive dating works by factoring in the rate of radioactive decay in materials, based on irrefutable and testable physical constants. So, no, it has not been ‘proved wrong’ – another falsehood peddled by fundamentalists.
Please tell me you don’t home school your children.
Tas Walker responds:
Hi Kirsty, I’m not surprised that you think this is nonsense. Many people react the same when when they first encounter such a radically different paradigm. However, I would encourage you to keep reading and to ask yourself what evidence you have for your statements. For example, read a few articles about how radioactive dating works. It has a fatal flaw and you would do yourself a favour to understand what that is.
DEREK WATSON
Fossils are old hat – they tell you nothing except that creatures were buried in flood layers. And buried quickly, otherwise they would not have been so perfectly preserved.
I agree with Tas – why should Jen’s bias against scripture in schools prevent both sides of the question being addressed? And why should historical accounts be described as myths – the recorded words are there to be read – unlike the aeons of time that are only there to be assumed.
Jen
Thanks Kirsty, I totally agree with your opinion 🙂
And Tas, who said anything about force? Not me.
You appear quite smug and patronising, implying that we who disagree with YOUR opinion simply haven’t read enough propaganda. Well, thank goodness not everyone insists on taking the bible literally. I formed my own opinion of it many years ago.
I will continue to enjoy the programme and leave you to The Flood.
Chandrasekaran
Almost nothing (singularity) to nice human (Homo sapiens) species evolution is the scientific dream creation story of the elite scientists and moral philosophers. This evolution has been happening so slow that there cannot be any credible eye witnesses or evidences. If there is any eye witnesses or evidences for evolution, they must be wrong for evolution cannot happen this fast. If there has been no credible eye witness or evidence even after methodical through scientific research by scientific community vetted by unbiased and open minded scientific peer reviews for many decades, this is the perfect credible scientific evidence for this evolution. Of course with a time machine able to travel billions of years back in the past, the elusive evidence is verified beyond any shred of doubt!!
DEREK WATSON
Kirsty,
how can you claim that the vast vast majority of parents do not want their children to attend scripture in schools sessions? Where i live and teach the figure is less than 5%. Parents who don’t want their kids to attend send letters to this effect to the school so that other activities are made available.
And as for all of you who dispute the flood – The Flood – and point to layers and layers of sediments on top of each other, have you ever questioned why the planes of intersection are so even, with no signs of the erosion that would have occurred if millions of years had elapsed between depositions. Look at the Grand Canyon and see that the successive layers were deposited within a short period.
All this origins “science” is just speculation based on a faulty idea that everything happens slowly, but even Steve Gould had to agree that catastrophies change this belief – Rome may not have been built in a day, but Pompeii was buried in one.
Symfonous
Thanks Tas Walker. Great article indeed. would love to have this knowledge at our schools too … Keep up the good work!
DEREK WATSON
Last night’s ABC presentation has a large carnivorous dinosaur causing a stampede at Lark Quarry; but a Uni. of Q’land article dated 16 Dec. 2010 rebuts this and claims the large dino was an ornithopod – a plant eater.
see http://www.uq.edu.au/diosaurs and key in Lark Quarry.
Perhaps the doco was made prior to the Dec date?
Kirsty
Derek,
“Where i live and teach the figure is less than 5%”… Well, there’s a rigorous scientific survey for you! Much like “well, all the people I know believe the moon is made of cheese”.
Where do you ‘live and teach’, by the way? Kentucky? Home of the glorious Creation Museum?
And as for “have you ever questioned why the planes of intersection are so even”… um, well that depends on the rate of deposition, whether there is faulting, erosion, weathering, tectonic movement etc. Sheesh, read a book on sedimentology and there is your answer! Pretty simple stuff – just get a library card for pity’s sake.
Tas,
I have read the Bible multiple times along with just about every other holy book you care to shake a stick at (which is probably more than you can say for most Christians). The difference is that I can tell fact from myth.
I have a great deal of respect for people with genuine faith and who actually behave in a way that is Christian (i.e. open-minded, charitable, tolerant of difference, kind to the weak etc.). It’s just that so few Christians actually follow this template. When I think of so-called devout Christians, I think of homophobia, greed, narrow-mindedness, meanness, rampant stupidity and a complete disregard for those with other views.
For example,YOU don’t like the TV series “Australia: A Time Traveller’s Guide”, so YOU don’t want it on television! Funnily enough, it never occurred to me to complain about “Songs of Praise” or any other religious program – I simply turn it off. Or I somehow manage to watch it without being contaminated by an alternative viewpoint!
Yet because of your personal religious convictions, you think that thousands of scientists and millions (if not billions) of people must be wrong – and feel the need to tell them so.
Who is the arrogant one here?
I really, really do not understand why there is this obsession with a ‘young earth’. It’s fine and dandy if you want to claim that Genesis is metaphorical. Many religious people do… even the Pope.
But to be so weirdly insecure and inflexible that it must be the LITERAL truth is just plain odd – and ultimately meaningless. Why does an old Earth negate the possibility of God? There is no contradiction between believing in God and believing that the Earth is 4.6 billion years old, so why does it threaten you so?Why is it so important that the Earth be ~6000 years old?
Nothing is so awe-inspiring than nature and nothing is as mind-boggling as the way the history of the earth has unfolded over billions of years. It is amazing how modern science is putting together the pieces of this history… one small discovery at a time.
A 6000 yr old Earth, on the other hand, is so small, crappy and uninteresting. And you must be kidding if you think that a young earth hypothesis is “radical”?! It’s what the majority of humanity has believed for most of the past 2 thousand years… hardly ‘radical’. People used to believe that the stars were pinpricks in the heavens. Should we believe that now?
Having access to a quality education is an enormous gift and privilege and one that I treasure. It’s a shame that you seem to have wasted yours.
Tas Walker responds:
Hi Kirsty,
The program Australia: The Time Traveller’s Guide is completely different from the question of what sort of music we prefer to listen to. The program is about world history and the nature of reality, and it impinges on people’s beliefs about life, relationships, God, the Bible.
My cricticism is that this program puts the information out there as if it is a scientifically proven fact, when it is not. None of the debates or problems with the idea is mentioned. It presents a belief system—a philosophical way of interpreting the world—as if it is a fact. There are huge problems scientifically with what is presented but these are never mentioned. No other view is given a serious airing on the ABC. Is there only one philosophy in the world? If the ABC were serious about exploring science and truth the DVD by Dr Carl Werner entitled Evolution the Grand Experiment would be an interesting one to put to air for a start.
Realistic one
LMAO. An obvious bible basher screaming about scientific theories on evolution. There’s a shock. I enjoyed the show immensely. My children were inspired to visit some of the sites nearby and look for fossil evidence. You seem to want to indoctrinate a population via govt funding with YOUR own personal beliefs. You argue that stories written by “witnesses” are facts. That would depend on the credibility of the witnesses (if they were actually witnesses). You say that two sides of the story should be shown. The scientific balanced out with the Christian bible version? Then to be fair, being a multicultural country with many faiths and beliefs why don’t they dig deep and find the funding to cover all the belief ideas? Muslim, Christian, pagen, and the other 19 main systems. Even better, how about the several hundred sub belief systems that are derived from these. We mustnt forget Scientology. That’s an official religion too. Bet that would be another interesting story. If you can’t see where I’m going with this I won’t bother explaining because you wouldn’t understand anyway. In summary, each person can believe what they wish to and others should respect that, but your beliefs shouldn’t be forced onto others as fact. It’s called FAITH for a reason. Stop looking for proof that doesn’t exist and just believe and be happy thinking that your beliefs are true. As long as they help you be a good person who respects others then that’s all that truly matters
Tas Walker responds:
Hi there unnamed one,
That is the whole point. You can believe what you wish but I object to my tax payments being used to push your particular religious beliefs exclusively.
JJoensuu
Of course the “scientific evidence” that people scream about is often (in fact VERY often when it comes to prehistory) based on INTERPRETATIONS derived from data PLUS ASSUMPTIONS.
This is a fact that evolutionists do not seem to want to admit.
Nevertheless the current situtation will likely continue until who-knows-when.
After all this way the public gets the information they like better (e.g. that romanticised evolution is “less boring”, judging from some posts here, and other reasons) written by people (the scientists) to whom they can refer as authorities.
The authors (the scientists), on another hand, will be unlikely to challenge the current dogmas because, for one thing, they are dependent on the approval of their peers.
Thank you Tas for the information you bring out. I know that every interpretation (yours also) has the potential of being at least somewhat incorrect. Still I think that your interpretations are reasonably speaking closer to the truth in most cases.
On another hand I do not see that the “days” mention in Genesis need to be interpreted literally. Other interpretations, such as those referring to Paul’s writing in Heb.4:1-9, would seem more reasonable to me.
With this I mean that the earth itself could be hundreds or thousand or even millions of years old, as after all the Genesis starts with the earth already existing (being empty except for the “watery deep” or global ocean). In my opinion the “days” are more of a reference to epochs or similar to “milestones” in modern project management.
Tas Walker responds:
It’s clear that the days in Genesis 1 are literal 24-hour days. Check this article for some reasons and read others on creation.com.