Part 4 of ten in an examination of 101 so-called scientific claims made by the Bible long before scientific discovery.
After looking at the first thirty, we’ve dismissed seventeen these as simply not being scientific claims at all, and we’ve yet to find any claim that science actually makes that is to be found either in the Bible, or that is unique to the Bible. Further, we’ve found an odd anomaly. It appears that there are some scientific claims that contradict the Bible, and the Bible is held to be correct and the science false. It is not clear, firstly, what the process was to decide between the competing claims between the Bible and science. Secondly, it’s not clear on which grounds it is decided to reject some scientific claims but not others. And thirdly, it’s not clear how such Biblical claims can be made, as the purpose of compiling the 101 “facts” was apparently to reveal scientific claims that pre-existed in the Bible, rather than contradictions between a Biblical interpretation and scientific claims. I can only conclude an ulterior motive or hidden agenda: a conclusion strengthened by the observation that the only scientific claims rejected are those for evolution.
Nevertheless, this post now examines the “facts” numbered 31-40.
31. The continents were created as one large land mass (Genesis 1:9-10). Many geologists agree there is strong evidence that the earth was originally one super continent – just as the Bible said way back in Genesis.
Geologists speculate that there was more than one super continent: Rodinia was formed 1.3 giga years ago (gya), and is different from, say, Panagea, the most recent, which as was around 250 million years ago. The claim that there was just a single super continent created by God is not one that is made by scientists. The claim is false.
32. Continental drift inferred (Genesis 7:11). Today the study of the ocean floor indicates that the landmasses have been ripped apart. Scripture states that during the global Flood the “fountains of the great deep were broken up.” This cataclysmic event apparently resulted in the continental plates breaking and shifting.
Genesis 7:11 says: ‘In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened.’ Scientists certainly do not claim that a large flood broke up any of the super continents, but rather it was due to the processes of plate tectonics and continental drift – neither of which is explicitly mentioned in the Bible. Needless to add, no human – Noah or otherwise – was around to at the time of any of the super-continents. The claim here blatantly false.
33. Ice Age inferred (Job 38:29-30). Prior to the global Flood the earth was apparently subtropical. However shortly after the Flood, the Bible mentions ice often – “By the breath of God ice is given, and the broad waters are frozen” (Job 37:10). Evidently the Ice Age occurred in the centuries following the Flood.
‘From whose womb comes the ice? Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens when the waters become hard as stone, when the surface of the deep is frozen?‘.
It is only an inference that can probably only be made with other scientific ideas about ice ages. It says nothing about any ice age specifically (there have been many) or what that actually means – it merely refers to the existence of ice as a weather phenomenon. Either way, Ice Ages or not, the suggestion appears to be that God makes the ice – something which science certainly does not claim, so this claim is false.
34. Life begins at fertilization (Jeremiah 1:5). God declares that He knew us before we were born. The biblical penalty for murdering an unborn child was death (Exodus 21:22-23). Today, it is an irrefutable biological fact that the fertilized egg is truly an entire human being. Nothing will be added to the first cell except nutrition and oxygen.
This is not exactly correct. There are very obvious biological differences between (for example) a one day old zygote and myself as a human being, or indeed an unborn child, such that to describe a zygote as anything funamentally more than a single fertilised cell is to misunderstand what it actually is, or to belittle what we commonly understand as making us “human”. We may of course use the word human as an adjective to describe a particular zygote, or foetus, to distinguish it from the zygotes and foetuses of other animals. This distinction has no bearing on the morality of abortion, to which is also alluded, and about which science makes no claims. No scientific claim as such is being tested against the Bible.
35. God fashions and knits us together in the womb (Job 10:8-12; 31:15). Science was ignorant concerning embryonic development until recently. Yet many centuries ago, the Bible accurately described God making us an “intricate unity” in the womb.
Science was ignorant until recently because science itself is fairly recent. Nevertheless, no scientific claim has been advanced here: one of the few things that every pre-modern and contemporary culture knows is that babies come from a woman’s womb, while no scientific theory today invokes a god fashioning or knitting anything. No claim here, then.
36. DNA anticipated (Psalm 139:13-16). During the 1950s, Watson and Crick discovered the genetic blueprint for life. Three thousand years ago the Bible seems to reference this written digital code in Psalm 139 – “Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect [unformed]; and in Thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.”
DNA is not a digital code, nor is it written in any meaningful sense of the word. Furthermore, the book which is referred to in Psalm 139 is not some sort of book within the human body, but something which apparently belongs to God: Psalm 139:16: ‘your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be‘ (although note the problems of translation). It is simply to read too much into the text to say that it suggests the existence of DNA. It does not, and the claim is false.
37. God has created all mankind from one blood (Acts 17:26; Genesis 5). Today researchers have discovered that we have all descended from one gene pool. For example, a 1995 study of a section of Y chromosomes from 38 men from different ethnic groups around the world was consistent with the biblical teaching that we all come from one man (Adam)
Science does not identify an “Adam” in the Biblical sense of the word, and does not say that there was anyone like “Adam” who was created by a God, of course…. but the logic of evolution is certainly does accord with the idea of humanity ultimately have common ancestors in Africa, a suggestion put forward in a number of Creation stories – not just the Biblical one. Hence, we find that the Bible on this occasion is at best not making a unique claim.
38. Origin of the major language groups explained (Genesis 11). After the rebellion at Babel, God scattered the people by confounding the one language into many languages. Evolution teaches that we all evolved from a common ancestor, yet offers no mechanism to explain the origin of the thousands of diverse languages in existence today.
Another misrepresentation of science – evolution deals in biology, not linguistics. Linguistics, however, does offer mechanisms to explain the origins of linguistic diversity, while palaepanthropoligists – the scientists alluded to above as theorising a common ancestry for all of humanity – also provide theories of migration that would account for linguistic diversity. None of the speak about any rebellion, so it’s simply a false claim.
39. Origin of the different “races” explained (Genesis 11). As Noah’s descendants migrated around the world after Babel, each language group developed distinct features based on environment and genetic variation. Those with a genetic makeup suitable to their new environment survived to reproduce. Over time, certain traits (such as dark skin color for those closer to the equator) dominated. Genesis alone offers a reasonable answer to the origin of the races and languages.
No, Genesis doesn’t alone offer a reasonable answer to the origin of races and languages – science does a pretty good job, too. Again, one could cite the reasonable theories of palaeoanthropology. Many – including a number of Christians – would go so far as to say that science offers the only reasonsable answer, based upon logic, evidence and testable hypotheses. Nevertheless, no scientific claim has been advanced here, so that’s another off the list…
40. God has given us the leaves of the trees as medicine (Ezekiel 47:12; Revelation 22:2). Ancient cultures utilized many herbal remedies. Today, modern medicine has rediscovered what the Bible has said all along – there are healing compounds found in plants.
Yes, ancient cultures used herbal remedies. Therefore, not a claim unique to the Bible.
Another ten “facts” examined, with five false portrayals of what science actually says, three “non-claims”, bringing the total number of “scientific facts” down from 101 to 81, and two claims that are not unique to the Bible.
