AN INCONVIENIENT EDUCATION

This is not a political tome, but begins with a political thought.

Since Trump’s election in 2016, the reaction by the liberals has been so far beyond vitriol, it has risen to a dangerous level.  In years past, conservatives have won elections, and liberals have won elections.  And in all these contests there were always two common threads to the aftermath.  First, there was a winner and a loser.  Second, the losers were gracious about it.  Not so this time around.

In reading news from many sources, I am laying the blame for this on poor education.  Poor education from public grade school all the way to ivy league graduate schools.  The corruption is nearly complete.

Now what do I mean by corruption?  There are many sides to many issues, and good points and theories to be made by all, however education has failed to do this.  Most of the blame for this must be laid at the feet of liberalism.  For it is in liberal schools, that thought has been suppressed.

A good education will teach a bright person how to think.  This is done by presenting the student with at least two sides of a controversial issue.  Positives and negatives are given on both sides of an equation, and then education and learning is achieved when the individual sorts through all of this and comes to an independent conclusion.

Sadly, in the liberal schools this process is not taught anymore.  For example, in the sixties, students at Berkley in California rioted for free speech.  In the fall of 2016, they rioted against free speech.  What happened?

Rather than educating students, students are indoctrinated with the school’s philosophy.  Failure to recognize different points of view shelters the students and makes them terrified of things they don’t understand.

So now to my main point, and why I titled this, “An Inconvenient Education.”

One if the things I struggle with is educators promoting “theories” as “facts.”  And there are two major areas in which this is done.  Evolution and Earth age.  I am going to focus on earth age, and leave evolution for another day.

There are two main theories concerning the age of the earth.  One is the earth is billions of year old, giving man time to evolve.  And the second is the Biblical perspective, in which man was created and the earth is around 7 thousand years old.  Scientists prefer the former, people of faith prefer the latter.  But in recent years, an interesting phenomenon has been occurring.  Religious people are trying to blend science with religion because they think scientists have proven themselves.  We shall see that they have not!

So now I am going to present some material that is not taught in school, however it is out there.  And to ignore it is ignorance.

A billion’s year-old earth is taught in school as fact, but is it?  First, let’s look at what is known as the Scientific Method.  Many people are under the impression that scientists observe some facet of nature or whatever, then make an educated guess as to the facts.  This is hardly the case.

Wikipedia has a good as definition as I have seen, and is presented below:

1.      Something in nature is observed.

2.      Questions are asked about the observation.

3.      A hypothesis is formed.

4.      Testable predictions are developed.

5.      Data is gathered to test the predictions.

6.      General theories are developed.

You have been taught by well-meaning educators that the earth is billions of years old.  Now I will show you some observations that will make you realize this is only a theory with many holes in it!

But first a disclaimer, I believe the Bible literally.  It is God’s word.  Period.  I cannot “prove” the Bible, but I can show a multi-billion-year-old earth philosophy cannot make it past the theory stage of its own evolution!

For my own belief, I will quote the words of Joseph Fielding Smith in October 1952.

So far as the philosophy and wisdom of the world are concerned, they mean nothing unless they conform to the revealed word of God.  Any doctrine, whether it comes in the name of religion, science, philosophy, or whatever it may be, if it is in conflict with the revealed word of the Lord, will fail.  It may appear plausible.  It may be put before you in language that appeals and which you may not be able to answer.  It may appear to be established by evidence that you cannot controvert, but all you need to do is to abide your time.  Time will level all things.  You will find that every doctrine, every principle, no matter how universally believed, if not in accord with the divine word of the Lord to His servants, will perish.  Nor is it necessary for us to stretch the word of the Lord, in a vain attempt to make it conform to these theories and teachings.  The word of the Lord shall not pass away unfulfilled, but these false doctrines and theories will all fail.  Truth, and only truth, will remain when all else has perished.”

And now to the fun stuff!

Geologists have developed a time scale based on radioactive time clocks, and claim to have calibrated the age of rock formations.  The problem is several “clocks” have been used, and they don’t all tell the same time!

Radioactive time clocks, at first glance, provide a good way of measuring rocks and things.  If one knows the decay rate of a material, one measures the current amount of the original element to the products of the decay process. (Science and Mormonism, Melvin A. Cook, 1967).

The problem with this method however is we do not know, or can we know, what the original condition was!  In other words, we know that 10-3=7.  It is impossible to know that 10 minus an unknown quantity equals something.

Radiocarbon forms in the earth’s atmosphere as a by-product of cosmic radiation.  Dr. Libby, who invented carbon dating assumed that the radiocarbon in the earth was in a state of equilibrium.  In other words, the amount of radiocarbon dying (half-life is 5760 years) equals the amount of replenishment by radiation.  As it turned out this was not true.  Unless we know the amount of radiocarbon in the biosphere when something died off, we have no way of measuring the change between then and today.  Or from the beginning to when it died.

And the most interesting part of this is assuming a radiocarbon free earth at its creation, the earth would have to be less than 30,000 years old!  And radiocarbon dating can be used on the atmosphere as well as rocks.  And it dates the atmosphere at a maximum of 12,500 years!

A book entitled “Prehistory and Earth Models, 1966” bears studying.  “The only way to tell time by radio time clocks is to know the ratio of the radioactive material at the end to that at the beginning of a specimen.”  This cannot ever be know!

Dr. Libby discovered that radiocarbon dating did not work, yet he had great faith in his creation because he ignored the problems the “scientific method” led him to.  He “just knew” the earth was billions of years old, regardless of the problems with his theorem.

So, did Dr. Libby prove anything?  No.  Can the Bible prove anything?  No.  So rather than teach theories as facts, all sides should be taught.  This is education!