A debate with a Columbia university professor.

Hi everyone,
Just recently Dr. Jason Lisle, former director of research for the Institute for Creation Research (ICR), started his own independent organization, the Biblical Science Institute. Daddy posted about Dr. Lisle on our Facebook page. That sparked a response from a professor from Columbia university in New York. Below is part of the conversation, some serious, some hilarious.

After Dr.Lisle shared the post more people got on and had more conversation with the professor. This professor is very smart and has impressive credentials.He was willing to have a conversation with me so I took the chance to discuss Biblical creation. The professor posted on his page that Dr. Lisle was his "target". But since I engaged him he took the chance to argue with me. He still wants to engage Dr. Lisle though. Enjoy reading the conversation. Here is professor Christie-Blick's original comment:

Jason's difficulty is that none of what he is saying is true. It's contradicted by readily checked evidence. There was no creation in six days, no Adam, no Eve, no fall, no global flood. At stake here are not different assumptions or world views. It is Jason's assumptions that are demonstrably not true. The great antiquity of the Earth is required by the huge array of events preserved in crustal geology, a history that even an undergraduate can appreciate if he or she takes the trouble to look. When Jason claims, as he often does, that we are all looking at the same facts, he distorts reality. Creationism depends upon ignoring most of what is known and misrepresenting the rest. He will disagree. So I challenge him to put his faith on the line, to test his beliefs, to join me in the field to examine that which he denies. He will ignore the challenge, and likely delete this post, because like all creationists he is threatened by the possibility that he might be wrong. Jason may have earned a PhD in astrophysics. He appears not to have internalized the essence of science – an approach to inquiry that depends on testing explanations against data, not fitting data to predetermined conclusions.

My first response:Nicholas. I would ask you to list one contradiction in Jason Lisle's argument? What evidence proves him wrong? How do you know that there was no no six day creation, Adam, Eve, fall, or flood? It is true that Dr. Lisle says that we look at the same evidence. In what way does this distort reality? We do look at the same evidence as evolutionists and creationists. We both look at the Grand Canyon for example. We as creationists realize that it is a result of catastrophic events around the time of the global flood, I know you deny that reality but you cannot dismiss evidence simply because you disagree. At least some evolutionists believe that the Grand Canyon was formed by the Colorado river flowing through the Grand Canyon over millions of years. I know that other evolutionists may have a different theory but I am using this as one example. We both look at the same evidence yet arrive at two very different conclusions. What evidence is Dr. Lisle ignoring? You said that " He appears not to have internalized the essence of science – an approach to inquiry that depends on testing explanations against data, not fitting data to predetermined conclusions." What evidence points to evolution? Evolution is not proven by data it is a theory that has not been proven. Everyone has a worldview, a set of your presuppositions, through which we interpret the evidence. This is why we come to two different conclusions when we look at the same evidence. A creationist comes to the evidence with the worldview of a young earth designed by God and an evolutionist comes to the evidence with a worldview of an old earth that came about through random chance. We both have predetermined thoughts of what the evidence should say. No one comes to the evidence unbiased. You challenged Dr. Lisle to put his faith on the line and to test his beliefs. I ask you to do the same. Consider how in an random chance evolutionary worldview you can account for uniformity of nature. In order for science to take place we must assume the uniformity of nature. If nature was not uniform how would we know that an experiment that we performed yesterday would have the same results today? For all we know the principles of science could have changed overnight. Without God you cannot account for uniformity. How do you justify uniformity in your worldview? I would love to be able to have a conversation with you about this issue and Dr. Lisle will not delete this post. You posted on our page so we are able to keep it up. And if you know Dr. Lisle at all you will know that he is not afraid of someone posing a challenge to his beliefs he has nothing to hide from. He stands by his beliefs as do I and I am happy to have a conversation where we challenge one another's views. Jason Lisle, you can do a lot better than I can with this. Do you have anything to add? ~Virginia, age 14

Professor Christie-Blick:Mark Sara Cowperthwaite Thanks for responding. Answers to most of your questions are right there in my original post. The idea of a young Earth is contradicted by the entire discipline of Earth science, beginning with the simplest observations in crustal geology. The age of the Earth is now known to the third decimal place: 4.567 billion years. The age of the universe is established from the rate of recession of distant galaxies as 13.8 billion years. The difference between those independent estimates precludes the creation myth of Genesis. The Grand Canyon is an excellent example of how creationists systematically ignore virtually everything that is known. I am very familiar with that geology. To take one example: Throughout the North American Cordillera, the Earth's crust was foreshortened by more than 100 km in the Cretaceous-early Tertiary periods (around 100-60 million years ago). Some estimates are a lot more than 100 km, but let's stay conservative. The rocks were rocks at the time, based upon the brittle style of deformation, and the fact that they are found as rounded fragments in Cretaceous sediments coeval with deformation. In the 'flood' interpretation of the Cambrian-Cretaceous strata of the Colorado Plateau, much of that deformation occurred within a span of one year while the sediments were still soft. The evidence is incompatible with that view. Evolution: The best evidence for evolution is genetic, with copious support from comparative anatomy, systematic paleontology, embryology, biogeography, Earth science and so forth. There is no contrary evidence. The science has been settled for decades. It has nothing to do with 'presuppositions'. Science works precisely because we continue to challenge everything, even the stuff we think we understand. Uniformity of nature: Your argument in essence is that complexity and the appearance of harmony are incompatible with 'random chance'. That is correct. The natural world is dominated by feedbacks. Evolution is strongly torqued by natural selection. 'Random chance' isn't the right way of thinking about a lot of phenomena, even if probability plays a role. You go on to question whether the fundamental rules of nature may have changed. They might, and under some circumstances (inside a black hole, for example), they almost certainly do. However, there is no basis for claiming arbitrary changes, and very strong evidence for supposing that the rules have operated as they do today for billions of years (with specific exceptions). Earth science again comes to the rescue because we have a record of what happened at a huge range of timescales. In creationist terms, we can compare 'pre-flood', 'flood' and 'post-flood' geology. The differences between these intervals are subtle, and associated for example with the evolution of life, and changes in climate and ocean and atmospheric chemistry. Radioactive decay constants were constant with an uncertainty of a tiny fraction of one percent. The bottom line is that beliefs contradicted by mountains of evidence can be confidently rejected as not true. It makes no difference whether you or Jason 'stand by' such beliefs. It is just puzzling that you might.

My response"Thank you for continuing the discussion. I enjoy the chance to discuss this topic. What study was done that proved the earth was billions of years old? What crustal geology contradicts a young earth because I am not aware of any? You said "The age of the universe is established from the rate of recession of distant galaxies as 13.8 billion years." But that again assumes uniformity by using the recession of galaxies as the basis for your assumption you assume that the recession rate has been the same in the past as it is in the present you have not yet provided justification for uniformity in your worldview. The essence of my argument is that without God you have no basis for assuming that the future will be like the past. Not complexity and the appearance of harmony being incompatible with random chance. You agreed that the fundamental rules of nature may have changed. Although you said that there is no basis for claiming arbitrary changes. Exactly there is no basis for saying such a thing. It would be crazy to say that the natural laws could change. Yet in your worldview you do not have a basis to say that they cannot. I hope that you saw at the end of my last post that I was only 14 years old. Since you are a professor I am positive that you can easily talk over my head with many scientific arguments. But I will address some points. For a good creationist position on the Grand Canyon's formation I would suggest the work of Steve Austin and Andrew Snelling. But I will mention Mt. St. Helens. I am sure that as a man who knows so much about geology you are well familiar with the site. We both agree that the eruption was in 1980 so when we look at the rocks that were formed the day of the eruption we know how old they are. I believe it was Dr. Steve Austin who removed a rock sample from the mountain after the eruption. When they dated the rock the dating results came back as vast ages even though we know that they were formed in the very recent past. This is just one example that shows that modern dating methods cannot always be trusted. You said that "The best evidence for evolution is genetic, with copious support from comparative anatomy, systematic paleontology, embryology, biogeography, Earth science and so forth. There is no contrary evidence." Could you please name one specific example of the evidence? What you said seems pretty vague so I would like some more specific examples. You also said ". The science has been settled for decades. It has nothing to do with 'presuppositions'." Please tell me how your presuppositions as a evolutionist do not taint your view of the evidence while you accused young earth creationists of trying to fit the data to predetermined conclusions? We do both have presuppositions yours are those of an evolutionist. You cannot deny that. I agree that theories that are proven to be false by mountains of evidence should be regarded as false. That is why I reject evolution. Again I am not a scientist and you can easily talk over my head so to put it into language that I more easily understand I think it would be easier to focus on how you can account for uniformity in nature. I do not think your above response fully answered the question. You said "However, there is no basis for claiming arbitrary changes, and very strong evidence for supposing that the rules have operated as they do today for billions of years (with specific exceptions). Earth science again comes to the rescue because we have a record of what happened at a huge range of timescales." There is strong evidence for uniformity because it is true but that does not explain how you justify it in your worldview. ~Virginia. Sye Ten Bruggencatedo you have anything to add to the conversation?

Professor:Mark Sara Cowperthwaite A characteristic of creationists is that they either ignore criticism or they argue endlessly. You achieve both in a single post. What study was done that has proved the Earth to be billions of years old? The entire discipline of Earth science. Hundreds of thousands of articles in the scientific literature. What crustal geology contradicts the idea of a young Earth? I have already provided several examples. No. The age of the universe doesn't depend on a constant rate of recession. Indeed, we know how the rate of recession has changed as a function of time. And there is in any case no way to plead 13.8 billion years down to 6,000. And no. There is no basis for claiming that natural laws have changed, and copious evidence that they haven't, or that any change has been miniscule. Again, nothing to rescue all manner of creationist inventions. Steve Austin and Andrew Snelling left the rails a long time ago. Their claims are uniformly bogus (aka incompatible with empirical data). Both have engaged in naive misrepresentation of geochronology – none of which has any bearing on the actual field. With regard to evolution: my best advice is to do some reading. There are several excellent summaries aimed at a lay audience. The National Academy of Sciences review of 2008 can be downloaded as a pdf at no charge. An important characteristic of science that creationists miss or misrepresent is that to the extent that assumptions are involved, those assumptions are themselves testable. That is very different from the creationist practice of fitting cherry-picked data to what you term a world view (assumptions that YOU are not prepared to challenge). Your difficulty here is that the specific 'presuppositions' (assumptions) of creationists have been tested and shown not to be true. I provided an example from the geology of the western United States (which you carefully ignored). Back on the subject of evolution: Not only has evolution NOT been disproven, not one piece of contrary evidence has come to light in more than 150 years. If you disagree, go to the scientific literature, and provide a citation for one article in support of your claim. Opinion pieces written be apologists aren't evidence.

Me: Nicholas. I ignore criticism of my worldview the same way you are ignoring the criticism to your worldview. I am arguing endlessly because you still have not provided justification from your worldview how you can make sense of uniformity of nature which is needed to perform scientific experiments. That is the argument I will continue to bring up until you fully answer the question. When you provide that I will use a different argument. I am not trying to plead 13.8 billion years into 6,000 years. The earth is 6,000 years old and evolutionists are the ones trying to make up new ages for the universe. You said ". And no. There is no basis for claiming that natural laws have changed, and copious evidence that they haven't, or that any change has been miniscule." I agree. You keep saying things like this. I am not arguing that they have. What I am asking you is to tell me what justification you have for uniformity not telling me what evidence there is to prove it. I am the one who has a basis that uniformity exists. The answer is God. You are the one who needs to provide a justification for it. On what basis have Dr. Austin and Dr. Snelling gone off the rails? What experiment did they do that has been refuted in peer reviewed journals? Not just articles on evolution but actually refuting an experiment they did. I know what evolutionists believe. No matter how much reading I do I will never become an evolutionist. I believe the Bible is my ultimate authority and the Bible says God created the world in six literal days about 6,000 years ago. I will not change my position. The thing about assumptions is that they are just that assumptions you can test them all you want but unless you can prove them as fact instead of theory they are still only assumptions. Because I am a presuppositional apologist like Dr. Lisle we challenge someone's core beliefs. Our core belief is that God created the world and He is the final authority on all matters of life. We take His written word as our final authority. This is our presupposition. What test was done that proved this to be wrong? As I said I am not an expert in science I cannot provide an answer to everything you may bring against me in regards to scientific papers. But there are many good scientists that have done real science experiments but so far you have slandered every scientist mentioned. Please provide a justification for uniformity of nature. ~Virginia

Professor: Mark Sara Cowperthwaite Your difficulty, my friend, is that you misunderstand and hence misrepresent science at a fundamental level – just like Jason Lisle. Science depends on testing explanations (hypotheses) against evidence. Ideas that survive tests are developed further. Ideas that fail to account for new data are discarded. At the research frontiers, it is common for more than one explanation to be in play at any one time. In marked contrast with creationism, science has nothing to do with inviolable world views. Assumptions are themselves testable, and explicitly tested. Science is endlessly self-checking. Reputations are made by discovering something new, not by reinforcing what is already known. Results are published in a critically peer-reviewed literature, and once published, subject to further criticism and re-evaluation. Science works. Planes fly. Medicines cure. Computers compute. Indeed, science is the only way we know anything. 

Presuppositional apologetics is the antithesis of science. You begin with the assumption that scripture is literally true. There is no circumstance in which you would reject core beliefs, though others insist with equal confidence on very different beliefs. Data to the contrary – which is to say, virtually all data – are routinely ignored. Unsurprisingly, much of what is believed isn't true.

I have provided you with one lead to get you started (on evolution). I have alluded to a great deal of published literature that you are welcome to check. Like all creationists, you will refuse to look into that which you do not understand because you have no interest in becoming informed, only in arguing (or ignoring).

The bottom line is that the age of the universe is well established (13.8 billion years). The age of the Earth is well established (4.567 billion years). Earth history is exquisitely documented and calibrated for the past one billion years, and with somewhat lower resolution prior to that. [The older record is much more fragmentary, and relative ages are harder to establish before the emergence of contemporary animal phyla.] Genetic, biological and paleontological data converge on the conclusion that humans belong squarely within a tree of life that extends back more than 3.5 billion years. All versions of creationism fail fundamentally for one reason: the Earth has a protracted history, a history that I demonstrate annually to first-year undergraduates in the field. That history is a matter of observation. It has nothing to do with assumptions. 

The expression 'creation scientist' is an oxymoron, for reasons discussed above. Such individuals do no research. They aren't guided by evidence. They don't publish in the scientific literature because manuscripts that fail to place data in appropriate context, that misinterpret data at a fundamental level, and that involve huge leaps in reasoning are unacceptable. Much of what Steve Austin and Andrew Snelling have claimed in their creationist writings is incompatible with readily reproduced observations. The Grand Canyon succession has nothing to do with a global flood. Mount St. Helens is irrelevant in this regard. The theory of evolution is settled science. Geochronology is a highly sophisticated research discipline. Denying or lying about science doesn't change the science.

Why do I care? The future of the United States depends on a well-informed electorate. Yet Americans today are woefully ignorant of science, and like you, not interested in becoming informed. The for-profit creation industry systematically undermines proper education, and indoctrinates generation after generation in demonstrably false mythology. I have devoted a career to research and education, and I am committed in my remaining years to helping to undo the damage. As one who is intimately familiar with the evidence, I am convinced that were a creationist like Jason (or you) to see for yourself up close, the experience would be clarifying. My credentials are on the web.
Later in the thread the professor said this: 
Jason Lisle writes: "If you would like to see an evolutionist's bald assertions utterly refuted by a 14 year old girl, check out the comments under this original post. It really shows how utterly bankrupt the evolutionist's position is."

Dear Jason: My several posts and responses are evidence-based, and consistent with more than 40 years in scientific

research and education. You are welcome to join me in the field to examine evidence for the great antiquity of our planet that you consistently deny or misrepresent. You have nothing to fear if your beliefs are correct. Yet you dare not take the risk. That, my friend, is the difference between science and faith. [FYI: The style of 'Virginia's' writing is incompatible with that of a 14 year-old girl.]

My response to his assertion that it was not actually me writing: "Once again you throw out the facts because they do not make sense to you."

The professor then accused in this comment:

Mark Sara Cowperthwaite Dear Virginia's mother: Your daughter is copying and pasting prose from sources she has read. Nicely done. It is nonetheless unfortunate that she (and you) are on the wrong track. No need to take my word for it. The facts are easy to check. However, you have to be willing to challenge beliefs. That, I think, is where you run into difficulties, right?

We have not been the only ones to ask him to retract this comment or to provide the sources that I am allegedly copying. One person said:
Nicholas Christie-Blick, produce the texts she is copying and pasting from or retract your statement.  

The professor replied: Robin Ingles-Barrett Robin, my friend, I didn't 'accuse' anyone of anything. I judged that the young lady was writing at a level beyond her asserted age. Well done, it turns out. That said, the content of what she was posting is typical of creationist prose all over the internet. She didn't come up with that on her own.

The Professor has stopped writing on this thread but I have proposed a formal public debate with Dr. Lisle. In response, he said that "debates have no value". You can look at the rest of the comments on our Facebook page here. I hope that you can see the failed worldview of the evolutionist along with any other worldview that contradicts the God of the Bible.

Soli Deo Gloria!

With love in the Lord,
Virginia