HOW OLD IS THE EARTH? AGE OF THE EARTH

Age of the Solar System

In this section we will examine the arguments of evolutionists and their creationist opponents regarding the age of the Earth. As you know, materialists estimate the age of our planet, as well as the entire solar system, in billions of years. A common figure is 4.5 billion years. But creationists are not sure about the venerable age of the Earth, because God did not need a huge period of time for creation. A number of creationists are convinced that the Bible is correct, and according to its chronology, the Earth and the Sun are approximately 6 thousand years old. There is a huge difference between 6,000 years and 4,500,000,000 years. Let's now look at the arguments from both of these sides.

The Big Bang Theory

There is a theory that the Universe is expanding. According to materialistic views, the Universe was formed billions of years ago as a result of a big bang. However, the explosion theory has obvious shortcomings. According to the law of conservation of angular inertia (conservation of angular momentum), after the explosion all its parts must rotate in one direction. However, Pluto, Uranus and Venus rotate in different directions; this proves that there was no explosion. In addition, Neptune, Saturn and Jupiter have several moons that orbit their planets in different directions.

Meteor dust

Tens of thousands of tons of meteor dust fall to Earth every year. These tiny particles from outer space contain more than 2% nickel. If we calculate the amount of nickel in the ocean, where it comes directly from the atmosphere and where rivers bring it, washing it off the soil surface, we will see that there is little nickel there. A huge “shortage” of this element was also discovered in the earth’s crust, which over billions of years should have accumulated much more than what is available today. Creation scientists argue that, based on the amount of nickel in the soil and ocean, our planet is several thousand years old, not billions.

All this speaks about the young age of the Earth and the Moon. Considering the above, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” Reply: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Comets. Oort cloud

Comets are fairly small astronomical bodies, up to several kilometers in diameter. Based on the big bang theory, their age should coincide with the age of the solar system, which, according to materialists, we recall, is 4.5 billion years.

Comets are made of ice, gases and grains of various metals; revolve around the Sun in elongated orbits. Passing near the Sun, these cosmic bodies, heating up, lose part of their mass, which, breaking away from the core, forms a trail called a tail. Naturally, due to such losses, the comet disappears over time - evaporates. According to scientists, a comet with a short rotation period only needs several thousand years to disappear. But for some reason, there are many comets in the Solar System, and the vast majority of them have not disappeared anywhere, which confirms the young age of our Solar System.

To somehow explain this fact, material scientists suggested that there is a certain region that is “hidden” somewhere on the outskirts of the Solar system and periodically exposes new comets to our view. This imaginary part of the Universe was even given a name - the Oort cloud. And now materialists peer with faith into the sky, hoping to find there the “parent” of all comets.

Considering the above, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” and unambiguously say: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Radiocarbon dating is wrong

Currently, several methods are used to determine the age of archaeological finds, the most reliable of which is considered to be radiocarbon dating. However, even this most reliable method has huge errors. Thanks to the analysis of the data obtained, scientists realized that the rate of radioactive decay is not constant, as previously thought, since it is influenced by many external factors. This means that the “atomic clock” gets lost depending on external conditions.

Here are just some examples of dating with the “most accurate” method. Carbon-14 (14 C) dating showed that the newly killed seal died 1,300 years ago; the shells of living snails were 27,000 years old; the age of a shell of a living mollusk is 2,300 years old, etc. In the Belt cave (Iran), the underlying layer is dated to be approximately 6,000 years old, and the overlying one is 8,500 years old. That is, the reverse sequence of layers is obtained, which, of course, is impossible. And there are many similar examples.

How can we explain this magnitude of error in the most accurate method?

Considering the above, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” with confidence: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Radioisotope dating

There are just as many problems with radioisotope dating. The essence of this method is that the number of atoms of a radioactive decaying element in a rock is compared with the number of atoms of a stable element resulting from its decay. Methods based on reactions are mainly used: uranium → lead; potassium → argon; rubidium → strontium.

Radioactive decay can be compared to an hourglass. However, this method has serious drawbacks: we cannot be sure of the constancy of the decay rate, since observations were carried out for less than 100 years, and scientists operate with an age of billions of years; the initial amount of the test substances in the sample is unknown; external factors that could change the ratio of the chemical elements under study and affect the reaction rate are not taken into account. All these reasons, both individually and in combination, can radically change the results of calculations.

It was found that the radioisotope dating method can lead to erroneous results hundreds of thousands of times! Creation geologists submitted samples for research whose age was known for certain. As a result of a study, rocks from a volcanic eruption that occurred in 1800 (that is, a little over two hundred years ago) in the Hawaiian Islands were erroneously dated to be between 22 million and 2 billion years old...

Considering the above, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” definitely say: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

The Earth's magnetic field is weakening

According to observations, over the past one and a half hundred years, the strength of the Earth's magnetic field has been decreasing. Since the German scientist Carl Friedrich Gauss began making these observations in 1845, it has decreased by 10%. It is reasonable to believe that tensions have eased before, although perhaps at a slower rate. That is, several tens of thousands of years ago, the planet’s magnetic field should have been much stronger, which would have made life on Earth impossible. This means that our planet is relatively young.

There is a theory among materialists that the weakening is associated with a slow change of poles: the South Pole moves to replace the North Pole, and vice versa. A number of researchers believe that magnetic reversal of polarity is not new for our planet and occurs without a certain periodicity...

Moon close to Earth

The Moon is slowly moving away from the Earth - at least 4 cm per year. This means she was closer before. As you know, the Moon is the cause of the ebb and flow of the tides. Millions of years ago, all the inhabitants of our planet would have died from frequent ebbs and flows, because water would have covered the entire Earth at least once a day. How were land animals able to survive?

Considering the above, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” clearly state: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

It is known that during the decay of uranium, lead and helium are formed, which are released into the atmosphere. As the lightest gas, helium accumulates in the upper layers of the atmosphere. Over billions of years, it must have accumulated in huge quantities - hundreds of thousands of times more than today. This confirms that the age of our planet is calculated in thousands, not millions of years.

Ice rings do not show years

Today you can hear about dating the age of the Earth using ice rings. It is believed that in the Greenland ice sheet every year a dark ring is supposedly formed in the summer (snow melting), and a light ring (ice growth) in the winter. However, an incident that occurred during World War II refuted this hypothesis. The planes made an emergency landing in Greenland. When, 48 years later, an expedition was sent there to seize documents, the planes were buried under a large layer of ice - 75 m, that is, the build-up was about 1.67 m in 1 year. To get to the cars, a well was drilled, and then they discovered that the ice rings are not annual, like those of trees. It turned out that dark rings of glaciers are formed not in the summer, but during the thaw period, which can occur dozens of times a year.

Age of the coral reef

The largest coral reef, the Great Barrier Reef, is located in the Coral Sea on the northeast coast of Australia. It attracted attention after being partially destroyed during World War II. As is known, coral reefs are formed by living marine colonial invertebrate polyps with a calcareous skeleton. Therefore, after the destruction, the reef continued to grow. His “wounds” began to heal, and the growth rate began to be regularly monitored. Knowing the size of the reef and its growth rate, creationists were able to determine its full age - 4.5-5 thousand years. Material scientists estimate the age of the reef at 8 thousand years. Both dates are not far from the biblical chronology, but do not fit well into the theory of a billion-year-old planet.

Understanding the seriousness of the arguments voiced, is it possible to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” say with conviction: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Polonium radio halo

Radiohalos are visible traces (in the form of rings) that are left in a mineral by emitted alpha particles when a radioactive element decays. Geologists were very surprised when they examined the structure of granite through a microscope. In this solid material they discovered a radiohalo of polonium-218.

Polonium-218 (218 Po), a product formed during the decay of uranium, has a very short half-life of only 3 minutes. Researchers have found it in huge quantities in granite on all continents...

Soil erosion

Many researchers believe that if our planet were several billion years old, its surface would have long ago become equal to sea level, because the earth is washed away by rain into the ocean. The process of soil destruction by winds, water and other natural factors is called erosion. But we still see mountains, hills and fells. This means that erosion occurs over a fairly short period of time.

Well-preserved coastlines also indicate the relatively recent division of one large continental mass into continents. Look at the shape of South America and Africa, they can still be “connected” (especially taking into account the shelf), like putting together a puzzle. But if we accept the theory of materialists, then in the hundreds of millions of years since the split (presumably 200–750 million years ago), erosion would have long ago eroded the coastlines.

Today, the rate of coastal erosion of the oceans (sliding, collapsing, washing away) varies in different places - from several tens of centimeters to several tens of meters per year. But even its lowest indicators do not fit into the multimillion-dollar age of the continents. For example, 10 cm x 1,000,000 years = 100 km. That is, in 200 million years, 20,000 km of land on each side should have disappeared. If we apply this calculation, then the modern map of the world should clearly look different: islands and peninsulas would have disappeared under the ocean water in hundreds of millions of years and the continents would have lost most of their land. Note that many countries invest a lot of money to strengthen their coastlines.

One more fact. Rain washes salts from the soil into the ocean. Today, the salinity of ocean water is only 3.2-3.5% (32-35 ppm). According to the calculated rate of salt accumulation, modern seas and oceans cannot possibly be billions of years old. Lakes, like seas and oceans, accumulate salts, but their salinity is low, which indicates their young age and indirectly confirms the young age of the Earth. Also, a number of scientists point to an insufficient amount of barium, cobalt, nickel, antimony and other chemical elements in the seas and oceans, which enter there in greater quantities than are removed.

Geological column

The geological column as a sequence of layers of the Earth was proposed at the beginning of the 19th century. Today, with its help, evolutionists are trying to explain the multi-billion-year age of our planet, during which these layers (layers) of the earth’s crust were supposedly formed.

However, this same geological column is evidence against evolution. The fact is that geological layers in the form in which they are presented on the geochronological scale generally accepted by materialists are extremely rare. In the vast majority of cases they are significantly mixed up and many are missing. According to geologist John Woodmorappe, 80 to 85% of the Earth's surface does not even have 3 geological periods represented in the "correct" sequential order. Of course, material scientists are trying to explain this by the movement of layers as a result of the movement of layers of the earth. Such an argument could be accepted if this “confusion” of layers were rare. But, as noted, the situation looks exactly the opposite.

Is it possible, after analyzing the above information and understanding this possibility, to answer the question: “How old is the earth?” answer with conviction: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Canyons

Often, as evidence of the great age of our planet, materialists demonstrate canyons - deep ravines, on the slopes of which layers of earth are clearly visible. In their opinion, such canyons were formed by rivers that flowed through one place for a long time and washed these ravines to a depth of several tens of meters to one and a half kilometers.

However, creationist geologists, on the contrary, see the canyons as confirmation of a grandiose catastrophe. For example, in the Grand Canyon in the USA, at an altitude of more than 1.5 km, you can find sea shells, although this area is far from the ocean. By the way, the remains of marine life are found even on Everest, the highest mountain in the world. This can only be explained by the fact that previously these earth layers were covered by sea water. It is also significant that the sandstone and limestone layers of the Grand Canyon contain breccias - pebbles from crumbled hard rock. They could appear inside the layers only as a result of a catastrophe and the subsequent “mixing” of the consequences of destruction. At the same time, the pebbles have sharp corners, and the oblong breccias are oriented in one direction. These facts prove that the breccias were in a liquid environment, but for a short time, since the water did not have time to “sharpen” their edges. It is obvious that this picture could well have formed after the retreat of the flood waters. In addition, the canyons contain sharp bends of parallel strata. It is very clear from them that the deformation occurred when the rocks were still unhardened and soft, since there are no large cracks, breaks or breaks in the places of bends.

Mutual responsibility

As for the names of geological layers, sonorous names were often invented for them without a direct connection with science. For example, a number of layers were named after the areas in which they were discovered (for example, Cambrian, Devonian, Permian, Jurassic), and some in honor of the ancient peoples who lived there (for example, Vendian, Ordovician, Silurian). Let us recall that scientific materialists imagined the possible vertical evolutionary development of organisms and arranged them according to the layers of the earth, in which theoretically their dead remains should have been located - each in its own era. But in reality, it is almost impossible to find places on Earth where the layers are located in the same sequence as shown in textbooks.

Therefore, the work of geologists, paleontologists and archaeologists is always complicated by one problem - to determine the name of the layer that they are studying. Both do not have the tools to accurately date the layer on their own. Therefore, until now, scientific geologists determine geological layers by the fossilized remains of organisms found there. And accordingly, archaeologists and paleontologists determine the age of finds by the name of the layer that geologists told them. It turns out to be a “mutual responsibility”, or rather a circle closed on itself. Of course, this practice is not scientific, but is based solely on an evolutionary worldview. But there is no other data for a reasonable and at least somehow proven dating of the layers.

Is it possible to think about the arguments presented here to the question: “How old is the earth?” declare with 100% conviction: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

Oil, coal, peat. Pierced layers

It’s no secret today that oil, coal and peat are organic substances that have changed over time. These are mostly former forests. These natural fossils are dated by materialists hundreds of millions of years ago, since, in their opinion, this is exactly the time needed for their formation. Therefore, some evolutionists consider minerals as one of the proofs of the venerable age of our planet. However, not all scientific materialists are categorical on this issue. The fact is that there are indisputable facts that make us think about the objectivity of popular opinion.

As already mentioned above, all the most ancient organic substances studied, including minerals, contain a decent amount of carbon-14, which cannot be according to the evolutionary model, since this radioactive substance should have completely decayed in fifty thousand years.

In addition, studies have shown that the formation of these fossils does not require millions of years. The above-mentioned volcanic eruptions on Mount St. Helens destroyed many of the arguments of the materialists. Landslides caused by the volcano filled the large Spirit Lake with tens of thousands of broken and uprooted trees. Floating on the surface in large groups, the trunks, rubbing against each other, dropped bark to the bottom. After some time, the trees began to drown. A few years later, researchers who descended under the water saw a most interesting picture: at the bottom of the lake in some places there was a three-meter layer of bark that began to turn into coal or peat...

Here it is worth stopping a little in the discussion about minerals and switching to another topic. The fact is that the scuba divers were surprised not only by the rapidly forming combustible fossils... The bottom landscape was a strange forest - tree trunks protruded vertically from the sedimentary layers. The physics of the formation of this “forest” is simple: some trees were uprooted, and therefore sank with their rhizomes down, where their base quickly drifted, so that they seemed to have grown into the bottom sediments. The speed of their flooding was different and so was the depth of the lake at which they found their refuge. Therefore, these trees were something similar to the remains of petrified forests that supposedly previously inhabited the Earth at different stages of time: below - more ancient, above - closer to us. Until this discovery was made, the US Yellowstone National Park was proud of its petrified forest, located at various altitudes, supposedly demonstrating different time periods of the Earth's life. As it turned out, such a forest could arise quickly as a result of a disaster, which is why the Yellowstone trees have the same short, broken rhizomes as the drowned trunks in Spirit Lake.

Upright petrified trees provide good evidence of rapid deposition of layers. Today, in hard rocks, vertical tree trunks are often found, as if “piercing” several layers of sandstone, coal, limestone..., indicating the rapid formation of layers. This situation is only possible if, during a flood, some trees sank with their heavy rhizomes down, and then the soil settled to the bottom in fractions. And this happened quite quickly, otherwise the upper part of the trunk would have had time to rot.

Rice. Petrified trees penetrate several layers

Let us now return to minerals again. There are several other related facts that confirm the young age of our planet.

For example, many oil and gas fields are located in porous rocks. However, to this day they are located in the bowels of the earth under very high pressure. If these minerals were formed many millions of years ago, then this pressure would have long since dissipated into the porous medium.

There is also a clearly beneficial effect from the practical application of the theory of creation: creation scientists, realizing that it took a short time for the formation of oil and coal, as a result of experiments discovered the process of quickly producing liquid combustible materials from organic matter and coal from wood. It was enough just to subject the samples to pressure at high temperatures. The results of these studies are now widely used in business activities in different countries of the world. That is, fossil oil and coal are organic matter (animals, plants) that somehow ended up in one place and was modified under the influence of pressure and temperature. It is difficult to imagine how this could happen over millions of years. After all, if trees and living organisms died gradually over a long period of time, then, like today, they would simply rot, forming soil - the top layer of the Earth. But the catastrophe of the flood explains this phenomenon well. During the flood, huge masses of vegetation and animal remains were carried by streams of water and currents to certain places, where they were subsequently overwhelmed by erupting hot rocks, moving landslides or layers of earth, and then covered with huge thicknesses of water, which created pressure of thousands of atmospheres, forming in a matter of months peat, coal or oil (depending on conditions). After the disaster, during the uplift of the soil, such deposits ended up in different places and at different distances from the surface.

It is surprising that seeing the presence of such facts, many people answer the question: “How old is the earth?” They declare with full confidence: “The age of the earth is 4.5 billion years”!?

The layers contain the results of human activity

Human products and traces of human activity are periodically found in coal and limestone layers, supposedly “hundred-million-dollar”. They even received the scientific name "Palaeoartifacts" or Unidentified Fossil Objects (UNFOs). These include, in particular, a metal parallelepiped of regular shape (“Salzburg parallelepiped”), found in a piece of hard brown coal; an iron nail embedded in a block of sandstone taken from the Kingudi quarries; An iron hammer “embedded” in rock, the wooden handle of which was petrified on the outside and turned into coal on the inside, discovered in Texas sandstone dating back 450 million years. At the Texas Museum of Creation, a pot found in a piece of coal is displayed next to a hammer. There are so many such finds that a number of books have already been written about them. Unidentified fossil objects include human footprints imprinted on fossilized rocks. Of course, all these findings can only be explained if we accept the Biblical flood theory.

Rice. An iron hammer, the wooden handle of which was petrified on the outside and turned into coal on the inside, and a kettle are in the Museum of Creationism in Texas

Dinosaurs are reliable witnesses

According to the accepted materialist theory, dinosaurs lived more than 65 million years ago. According to creationists, lizards were created along with all animals, which means that their remains cannot be more than 6-7.5 thousand years old. And this chronology is confirmed by numerous facts. Thus, many dinosaurs found have a low degree of bone fossilization. Due to their increased thickness, they apparently simply did not have enough time to mineralize completely. There were even bones with soft tissue and red blood cells. It is clear that such organic matter does not survive for millions of years.

How can you, having studied and analyzed this question, continue to claim that the age of the earth is 4.5 billion years, realizing that it is impossible to know exactly how old the earth is and that dinosaurs lived 65 million years ago...?!

All people descended from "Adam" and "Eve"

Eve's mitochondrial DNA and Adam's Y chromosome are now scientific concepts of geneticists. Many scientists, including materialists, today agree that all women of the surviving human species Homo Sapiens come from one “first” - “Eve”, and similarly all men from one “first” - “Adam”. Attempts to determine their age give conflicting results... However, one thing is clear - the genetic paths each lead to their own point, which is extremely difficult to imagine if you follow the logic of Darwin's theory, according to which the monkey population gradually evolved into humans over millions of years.

In addition, it is also interesting that the age of the “first” man is determined to be 60–90 thousand years, and the “first” woman – 140–230 thousand years. According to scientific materialists, it turns out that a woman of the genus Homo (humans), 50 - 170 thousand years after the emergence of man, met a man of the same genus Homo, but of a different species, from which modern people of the species Homo Sapiens came. And the descendants, that is, entire clans and peoples... from other men and women of the genus Homo, who multiplied on the planet before and after this meeting, strangely all subsequently died out. Even a non-specialist understands that it is simply impossible to imagine such a picture in real life. But scientific materialists are forced to believe in this, otherwise the platform of their evolutionary theory will collapse.

Population growth corresponds to the biblical age of the earth

To determine the approximate population growth, it is necessary to know two basic quantities: the average number of children in a family and the average age of a generation. Using these parameters, it is possible to at least approximately calculate the population of the Earth. If we accept the theory of evolution, according to which man has existed on Earth for about 200,000 years, then with an average age of generations of 25 years, it turns out that there have been 8,000 generations on the planet. And if we assume that for each generation the population of the Earth increased by 20% (this figure can be reduced, which will not change the order of the numbers much), then it turns out that by our time the number of people on the planet should have been an immeasurably fantastic figure! So, the twentieth generation from the first two people should have numbered about 60 people, the fiftieth - already about 15,000, the hundredth - about 140,000,000, and the one hundred and twenty-second - already exceeded the modern population of the Earth - 7,600,000,000. And if it comes about thousands of generations, then even an engineering calculator cannot calculate this figure... And the area of ​​the entire Earth would not be enough to simply put people living on it side by side. According to modern studies of the growth of the Earth's population, taking into account wars and epidemics, people may well live on our planet for about 4.5 - 6 thousand years, that is, the time after the biblical flood.

Also interesting is the fact that there are no numerous burial places on our planet of people who, according to materialists, lived on it for 200 thousand years. We find many skeletons of a wide variety of dinosaurs and other fossil animals... but not so many human bones. Although, logically, the earth should abound in human skeletons, since the intelligent being that is man should have been more attentive to the corpses of his ancestors. Even if all human bones rotted, how could numerous stone tools that people used, according to evolutionists, for tens and even hundreds of thousands of years, rot into dust?

Ancient civilizations are no more than 5.5 thousand years old

The most ancient well-known human civilizations, like their writing, according to the most daring estimates, date back to no more than 5.5 thousand years old. Note - not 10 thousand, not 20 thousand, and especially not 200 thousand years, how long, according to evolutionists, Homo sapiens has existed. It is hardly possible that humanity lived for tens and even hundreds of thousands of years, without leaving behind evidence of intelligent life and writing, and then suddenly, no later than 5.5 thousand years ago, began to actively cover the earth with evidence of its existence.

How can you, having carefully studied these objective arguments, continue to talk about something other than “How old is the earth?” and insist that the age of the Earth is 4.5 billion years?!

Unique living conditions

The Bible says that God created the Earth specifically for habitation:

“The Lord, who created the heavens... formed the earth...; He approved it, not in vain...; He educated her to live" 1

Often, we people don’t even think about how unique living conditions surround us. Even materialists do not hide their surprise at the wonderful positive random “coincidences” that allegedly contributed to the origin of life on Earth. The combination of these conditions even received the scientific name “Anthropic principle”.

For example, if you change the distance from the Earth to the Sun up or down, then staying on our planet will become less comfortable or completely impossible. The same applies to many other factors. For example, the composition of air only as it is is optimally suitable for life on Earth. If you slightly reduce oxygen and slightly increase carbon dioxide, or vice versa... which also applies to other gases that make up the atmosphere, then all living things on the planet will immediately feel it. And with a change of a few percent in the ratio of gases in the air, everything breathing on the planet will face the end!

Not only the lower layer of the atmosphere is unique. In general, the entire atmosphere - external and internal - is extremely important for the planet. If its “protective” composition were weaker, then radiation from Space could kill all life on Earth. Or, on the contrary, if the atmosphere retained the sun’s rays to a greater extent than it does now, then the planet would not have enough heat, energy and ultraviolet radiation (which, in addition to negative ones, also has positive properties for the Earth and earthlings).

It is worth recalling photosynthesis. The air suitable for living beings contains oxygen. But what they exhale is carbon dioxide. That is, logically, after a certain time, everything breathing on the planet should have died, since oxygen would have run out in the atmosphere and carbon dioxide would have increased... But plants help maintain sufficient levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the air. In sunlight, with the participation of water, the process of photosynthesis occurs, which results in the absorption of carbon dioxide and the release of oxygen.

I think, dear reader, you understand that you can continue to list the unique facts of the “Anthropic Principle”. That is, all the basic parameters of the Sun and Earth, the subtle consistency of physical laws and world constants, cannot but make one admire either “your majesty’s chance” or the intelligent Creator of heaven and Earth.

1 Bible. Old Testament, book of the prophet Isaiah, 45:18

Lack of scientific evidence

There is a fact confirming that material scientists cannot provide unambiguous evidence of their theory about the random formation of the Earth, life on it and vertical evolution. More than 10 years ago, the famous proponent of scientific creationism, Kent Hovind, in a public appeal, offered $250,000 to anyone who could provide at least one piece of empirical evidence (scientific confirmation) of evolution. Until now, there has not been a single contender for this money!

Really, realizing that there is no real evidence, people answer the question: “How old is the earth?” will they consider: “The age of the earth is more than 4 billion years”!?

Conclusion to the section

If you look impartially at the facts, it will become objective that materialists do not have irrefutable scientific evidence of the evolution and great age of our planet. For all the theoretical arguments of adherents of the theory of Darwin and the Big Bang, there are weighty counter-arguments from creationists. And let me remind you that it is not scientists who argue with church ministers, but scientists with scientists. In the hands of opponents are diplomas, titles and regalia, as well as scientifically based evidence in favor of their position.

And at the same time, materialists do not have real indisputable evidence, but their theory has many contradictions and gives rise to questions for which there are no answers. Only some of these issues have been addressed in this book. I am sure that readers are convinced that the questions posed are extremely important, since reasonable answers to them refute evolution and the multi-billion-year age of the Earth, but at the same time confirm Intelligent Creation. And since there is the possibility of an alternative, we simply cannot turn a blind eye to it. That is, the concept of creationism should be perceived as competitive - scientific, despite the fact that in essence it is religious.

How old is the earth, geological layers, age of the earth, Cambrian explosion, when dinosaurs lived, EXPOSING THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION

The history of our planet still holds many mysteries. Scientists from various fields of natural science have contributed to the study of the development of life on Earth.

Our planet is believed to be about 4.54 billion years old. This entire time period is usually divided into two main stages: Phanerozoic and Precambrian. These stages are called eons or eonothema. Eons, in turn, are divided into several periods, each of which is distinguished by a set of changes that occurred in the geological, biological, and atmospheric state of the planet.

1. Precambrian, or cryptozoic is an eon (time period in the development of the Earth), covering about 3.8 billion years. That is, the Precambrian is the development of the planet from the moment of formation, the formation of the earth’s crust, the proto-ocean and the emergence of life on Earth. By the end of the Precambrian, highly organized organisms with a developed skeleton were already widespread on the planet.

The eon includes two more eonothems - catarchaean and archaean. The latter, in turn, includes 4 eras.

1. Katarhey- this is the time of the formation of the Earth, but there was no core or crust yet. The planet was still a cold cosmic body. Scientists suggest that during this period there was already water on Earth. The Catarchaean lasted about 600 million years.

2. Archaea covers a period of 1.5 billion years. During this period, there was no oxygen on Earth yet, and deposits of sulfur, iron, graphite, and nickel were being formed. The hydrosphere and atmosphere were a single vapor-gas shell that enveloped the globe in a dense cloud. The sun's rays practically did not penetrate through this curtain, so darkness reigned on the planet. 2.1 2.1. Eoarchaean- This is the first geological era, which lasted about 400 million years. The most important event of the Eoarchean was the formation of the hydrosphere. But there was still little water, the reservoirs existed separately from each other and did not yet merge into the world ocean. At the same time, the earth's crust becomes solid, although asteroids are still bombarding the earth. At the end of the Eoarchean, the first supercontinent in the history of the planet, Vaalbara, formed.

2.2 Paleoarchean- the next era, which also lasted approximately 400 million years. During this period, the Earth's core is formed and the magnetic field strength increases. A day on the planet lasted only 15 hours. But the oxygen content in the atmosphere increases due to the activity of emerging bacteria. Remains of these first forms of Paleoarchean life have been found in Western Australia.

2.3 Mesoarchean also lasted about 400 million years. During the Mesoarchean era, our planet was covered by a shallow ocean. The land areas were small volcanic islands. But already during this period the formation of the lithosphere begins and the mechanism of plate tectonics starts. At the end of the Mesoarchean, the first ice age occurs, during which snow and ice first formed on Earth. Biological species are still represented by bacteria and microbial life forms.

2.4 Neoarchaean- the final era of the Archean eon, the duration of which is about 300 million years. Colonies of bacteria at this time form the first stromatolites (limestone deposits) on Earth. The most important event of the Neoarchean was the formation of oxygen photosynthesis.

II. Proterozoic- one of the longest time periods in the history of the Earth, which is usually divided into three eras. During the Proterozoic, the ozone layer appears for the first time, and the world ocean reaches almost its modern volume. And after the long Huronian glaciation, the first multicellular life forms appeared on Earth - mushrooms and sponges. The Proterozoic is usually divided into three eras, each of which contained several periods.

3.1 Paleo-Proterozoic- the first era of the Proterozoic, which began 2.5 billion years ago. At this time, the lithosphere is fully formed. But the previous forms of life practically died out due to an increase in oxygen content. This period was called the oxygen catastrophe. By the end of the era, the first eukaryotes appear on Earth.

3.2 Meso-Proterozoic lasted approximately 600 million years. The most important events of this era: the formation of continental masses, the formation of the supercontinent Rodinia and the evolution of sexual reproduction.

3.3 Neo-Proterozoic. During this era, Rodinia breaks up into approximately 8 parts, the superocean of Mirovia ceases to exist, and at the end of the era, the Earth is covered with ice almost to the equator. In the Neoproterozoic era, living organisms for the first time begin to acquire a hard shell, which will later serve as the basis of the skeleton.

III. Paleozoic- the first era of the Phanerozoic eon, which began approximately 541 million years ago and lasted about 289 million years. This is the era of the emergence of ancient life. The supercontinent Gondwana unites the southern continents, a little later the rest of the land joins it and Pangea appears. Climatic zones begin to form, and the flora and fauna are represented mainly by marine species. Only towards the end of the Paleozoic did land development begin and the first vertebrates appeared.

The Paleozoic era is conventionally divided into 6 periods.

1. Cambrian period lasted 56 million years. During this period, the main rocks are formed, and a mineral skeleton appears in living organisms. And the most important event of the Cambrian is the emergence of the first arthropods.

2. Ordovician period- the second period of the Paleozoic, which lasted 42 million years. This is the era of the formation of sedimentary rocks, phosphorites and oil shale. The organic world of the Ordovician is represented by marine invertebrates and blue-green algae.

3. Silurian period covers the next 24 million years. At this time, almost 60% of living organisms that existed before die out. But the first cartilaginous and bony fishes in the history of the planet appear. On land, the Silurian is marked by the appearance of vascular plants. Supercontinents are moving closer together and forming Laurasia. By the end of the period, ice melted, sea levels rose, and the climate became milder.

4. Devonian period is characterized by the rapid development of diverse life forms and the development of new ecological niches. The Devonian covers a time period of 60 million years. The first terrestrial vertebrates, spiders, and insects appear. Sushi animals develop lungs. Although, fish still predominate. The flora kingdom of this period is represented by propferns, horsetails, mosses and gosperms.

5. Carboniferous period often called carbon. At this time, Laurasia collides with Gondwana and a new supercontinent Pangea appears. A new ocean is also formed - Tethys. This is the time of the appearance of the first amphibians and reptiles.

6. Permian period- the last period of the Paleozoic, ending 252 million years ago. It is believed that at this time a large asteroid fell on Earth, which led to significant climate change and the extinction of almost 90% of all living organisms. Most of the land is covered with sand, and the most extensive deserts appear that have ever existed in the entire history of the development of the Earth.

IV. Mesozoic- the second era of the Phanerozoic eon, which lasted almost 186 million years. At this time, the continents acquired almost modern outlines. A warm climate contributes to the rapid development of life on Earth. Giant ferns disappear and are replaced by angiosperms. The Mesozoic is the era of dinosaurs and the appearance of the first mammals.

The Mesozoic era is divided into three periods: Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous.

1. Triassic period lasted just over 50 million years. At this time, Pangea begins to break apart, and the internal seas gradually become smaller and dry out. The climate is mild, the zones are not clearly defined. Almost half of the land's plants are disappearing as deserts spread. And in the kingdom of fauna the first warm-blooded and land reptiles appeared, which became the ancestors of dinosaurs and birds.

2. Jurassic covers a span of 56 million years. The Earth had a humid and warm climate. The land is covered with thickets of ferns, pines, palms, and cypresses. Dinosaurs reign on the planet, and numerous mammals were still distinguished by their small stature and thick hair.

3. Cretaceous period- the longest period of the Mesozoic, lasting almost 79 million years. The separation of the continents is almost ending, the Atlantic Ocean is significantly increasing in volume, and ice sheets are forming at the poles. An increase in the water mass of the oceans leads to the formation of a greenhouse effect. At the end of the Cretaceous period, a catastrophe occurs, the causes of which are still not clear. As a result, all dinosaurs and most species of reptiles and gymnosperms became extinct.

V. Cenozoic- this is the era of animals and homo sapiens, which began 66 million years ago. At this time, the continents acquired their modern shape, Antarctica occupied the south pole of the Earth, and the oceans continued to expand. Plants and animals that survived the disaster of the Cretaceous period found themselves in a completely new world. Unique communities of life forms began to form on each continent.

The Cenozoic era is divided into three periods: Paleogene, Neogene and Quaternary.

1. Paleogene period ended approximately 23 million years ago. At this time, a tropical climate reigned on Earth, Europe was hidden under evergreen tropical forests, only deciduous trees grew in the north of the continents. It was during the Paleogene period that mammals developed rapidly.

2. Neogene period covers the next 20 million years of the planet's development. Whales and bats appear. And, although saber-toothed tigers and mastodons still roam the earth, the fauna is increasingly acquiring modern features.

3. Quaternary period began more than 2.5 million years ago and continues to this day. Two major events characterize this time period: the Ice Age and the emergence of man. The Ice Age completely completed the formation of the climate, flora and fauna of the continents. And the appearance of man marked the beginning of civilization.

As you know, the solar system includes a number of planets, including the Earth, which is located third from the common celestial body. Our planet is the largest, both in weight and density, and in size, of all the planets included in the terrestrial group. Humanity does not know for certain whether there is life in the Universe, so we ourselves have decided to classify the Earth as a unique planet, located both in our solar system and outside it.

According to many researchers, our planet was born after the big bang about 4.5 - 6 billion years ago. Almost immediately, by cosmic standards (after 10 million years), the Earth acquired a natural satellite - the Moon, whose rotation to this day occurs around the Earth's orbit, exerting a passing influence on the ebb and flow of the tides. Thanks to the Moon, the tilt of the earth's axis became constant.

Over the course of many millennia, the Earth's topography has changed significantly, largely due to periodic meteorite impacts. Some of the fallen specimens caused the extinction of some species of living beings, the formation and climate change. Researchers, using the fossilized remains of living beings and plants, determined the age of the Earth. Such remains gave impetus to the formation of minerals in the depths. Studying the history of the existence of our planet, researchers are inclined to think that the Earth has overcome five main stages of its development. Such stages are called eras.

The most ancient of them are Archean And Proterozoic, got their names from Greek words (“old, ancient” and “first, initial”, respectively). It is generally accepted that in the Proterozoic era, about 3.5 billion years ago. The remaining eras have been studied much better by researchers, since they are younger. Three eras: Paleozoic(from Greek “ancient”), Mesozoic(from the Greek “middle”) and Cenozoic(from the Greek “new”) is usually divided into eras and centuries.

Due to the development of atomic physics in recent years, researchers have been able to reliably determine the age of fossils. In this matter, radioactivity came to their aid. Thanks to the use of its properties, scientists decompose atoms of various earthly rocks, determine their decay period, which, in turn, can reliably indicate the age characteristics of the sample being studied. This method of determining the age of the existence of rocks answered the question of how many years the Earth has existed.

Jan 11 2014

How old is the Earth? Scientists believe that the Earth is 454 billion years old. Coincidentally, this is the same age as the rest of the planets in the solar system, as well as the Sun. Of course, this is not a coincidence, and the Sun and planets all formed together with a diffuse cloud of hydrogen billions of years ago.
At the beginning of the solar system, all the planets formed in the solar nebula; remnants left over from the formation of the Sun. Small dust particles collected together in large and small objects - pebbles, stones, boulders, etc. - until many planetoids appeared in the solar system. These planetoids collided together and eventually came together to become the size of Earth.

At some point in Earth's early history, an asteroid the size of Mars crashed into our planet. The collision sent debris into orbit, eventually forming the Moon.
How do scientists know that the Earth is 454 billion years old? It's actually hard to tell from the planet's surface only, as plate tectonics is constantly reshaping its surface. Old parts of the surface layer under new plates to be recycled in the Earth's core. The most ancient rocks ever found on Earth are 4.0 - 4.2 billion years old. Scientists suggest that all the material in the solar system was formed at the same time. Various chemicals, particularly radioactive isotopes, were formed together. Because they decay at very known rates, these isotopes can be measured to determine how long the elements have existed. And by studying different meteorites from different places in the solar system, scientists know that different planets arose at the same time.
Failed methods for calculating the age of the Earth
Our current, accurate method of measuring the age of the Earth comes at the end of a long series of estimates made throughout history. Clever scientists have discovered features of the interaction between the Earth and the Sun that change over time, and then calculate how many years ago planet Earth came into being. Unfortunately, all calculations were flawed for various reasons.
Falling sea levels - Benoit de Maillet, a French anthropologist who lived from 1656-1738 and guessed (wrongly) that fossils in the highlands meant the Earth was once covered by a large ocean. This ocean evaporated 2 billion years ago to the current sea level. Scientists abandoned this theory when they realized that sea levels naturally rise and fall.
Cooling of the Earth - William Thompson William Thompson, later known as Lord Kelvin, theorized that the Earth was once a molten ball of rock at the same temperature as the Sun, and then has been cooling ever since. Based on these assumptions, Thompson estimated that it took somewhere between 20 and 400 million years for the Earth to form to cool to its current temperature. Of course, Thompson made some inaccurate assumptions, about the temperature of the Sun (it's really 15 million Kelvin at its core), the temperature of the Earth (with its molten core) and how the Sun is made of hydrogen and the Earth is made of rock and metal.
Cooling of the Sun - In 1856, German physicist Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von Helmholtz attempted to calculate the age of the Earth by cooling the Sun. He calculated that it would have taken 22 million years for the Sun to condense to its current diameter and temperature from a diffuse cloud of gas and dust. Although this was inaccurate, Helmholtz correctly determined that the source of the Sun's heat was due to gravitational contraction.
Rock Erosion - In his book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Charles Darwin suggested that the erosion of chalk deposits could allow for the calculation of the minimum age of the planet. Darwin estimated that the formation of chalk in the Heath region of England may have taken 300 million years to form the weather in its present form.
Moon
Orbit of the Moon - George Darwin, son of Charles Darwin, guessed that the Moon may have been formed from the Earth, and drifted to its current location. Fission theory proposed that the rapid rotation of the Earth caused a piece of the planet to spin into space. Darwin estimated that it took the Moon at least 56 million years to reach its current distance from Earth. We now know that the Moon likely formed when an object the size of Mars crashed into Earth billions of years ago.
Ocean Salinity - In 1715, the famous astronomer Edmund Halley proposed that the salinity of the oceans could be used to determine the age of the planet. Halley noted that oceans and lakes fed by streams constantly receive more salt, which then gets stuck around as the water evaporates. Over time, the water will release salt, allowing you to estimate how long this process has been going on. Various geologists who have used this method have guessed that the Earth was formed between 80 and 150 million years. This method was flawed because scientists did not understand that the geological processes of extracting salt from water do not provide reliable data.
Radiometric dating Provides an accurate method to know the age of the Earth
In 1896, French chemist A. Henri Becquerel discovered radioactivity, a process in which materials decay into other materials, releasing energy. The geologist realized that the interior of the Earth contained large amounts of radioactive material, and this would be the basis for calculating the age of the Earth. Although this discovery showed shortcomings in previous methods of calculating the age of the Earth, it provided a new method: radiometric dating
Geologists have discovered that radioactive materials decay into other elements at very predictable rates. Some materials decay quickly, while others can take millions or even billions of years to reach complete decay. Ernest Rutherford and Frederick Soddy, working at McGill University, determined that half of any isotope of a radioactive element decays into another isotope as it accelerates. For example, if you have a certain amount of thorium-232, half of it will take over a billion years to decay, and then half of that amount will decay in another billion years. This is the origin of the term "half-life". By measuring the half-lives of radioactive isotopes, geologists have been able to construct a measurement table that allows them to accurately calculate the age of geological formations, including the Earth. They used the decay of uranium and various lead isotopes. By measuring the amounts of three different isotopes of lead (Pb-206, Pb-207, and Pb-208 or Pb-204), geologists can calculate how much uranium was originally in a sample of the material.

If the Solar System is formed from a common pool of matter, with Pb isotopes evenly distributed, then all objects from this pool of matter should show the same number of isotopes. In addition, over time, the amounts of Pb-206 and Pb-207 will change, because these isotopes are end products of the decay of uranium. This makes the amount of lead and uranium change. The higher the uranium to lead ratio in a rock, the more the Pb-206/Pb-204 and Pb-207/Pb-204 values ​​will change over time. Now, if we assume that the source of the solar system is also evenly distributed with uranium isotopes, then we can draw a line of data showing the lead-to-uranium plot and, by the slope of the line, the amount of time that has passed since the pool of matter became separated into separate objects can be calculated.
Bertram Boltwood applied this dating method to 26 different rock samples, and found that they were formed between 92 and 570 million years, and further refinements to the technique gave ages between 250 million and 1.3 billion years.
Geologists set out to explore the Earth, looking for the oldest rock formations on the planet. The oldest rock surfaces are found in Canada, Australia and Africa, ranging in age from 2.5 to 3.8 billion years. The oldest rocks were discovered in Canada in 1999, and are estimated to be just over 4 billion years old.
This has established a minimum age for the Earth, but due to geological processes such as weathering and plate tectonics, it may still be older.

Meteorites as the definitive answer to the age of the Earth
The problem with measuring the age of rocks on Earth is that the planet is under constant geological change. Plate tectonics is constantly reworking parts of the Earth, mixing them up and forever hiding the oldest regions of the planet. But if we assume that everyone in the solar system formed at the same time, meteorites in space were independent of weather conditions and plate tectonics here on Earth.
Geologists have used these ancient objects, such as the Diablo Canyon meteorites (fragments of the asteroid that impacted Barringer Crater), as a way to discover the true age of the solar system, and therefore the Earth. Using a radiometric dating system for these meteorites, geologists were able to determine that the Earth is 454 billion years old, within an error of about 1%.

AGE OF THE EARTH

Many of us believe that science, while cognizing the world, does not find a place in it for the Creator God. This often pushes Orthodox Christians away from science because they fear that their faith may be shaken by exposure to scientific knowledge. In fact, true faith is only strengthened by “considering creations,” and it is not at all accidental that many scientists were deeply religious people.

The problem of the age of the Earth, stars and the Universe as a whole still remains unresolved. The fact is that scientific estimates of this age have a huge range - from 7-10 thousand years to 10-15 billion years, and some scientists even insist on the infinity of the existence of the Universe.

This position was held by the famous Russian materialist scientist V.I. Vernadsky, since otherwise, in his opinion, it is impossible to understand the emergence of life, which, due to its extreme complexity, could not arise from inanimate matter, and, thus, it is required that the Universe always existed and carried within itself some “seeds of life”. V.I. Vernadsky actively, but to no avail, searched for these “embryos” in meteorites that fell to Earth from space. Evolutionists, on the contrary, since the 18th century have asserted the theory of the spontaneous generation of life, citing the appearance of worms in a rotting mass and the like. This view was refuted by the deeply religious physiologist Louis Pasteur. To this day, in his institute in Paris, there is a vessel with a “nutrient broth” he prepared, in which nothing has “spontaneously generated” for more than 100 years. It remains completely transparent. But if this broth came into contact with dust particles floating in the air and carrying bacteria, viruses and plant seeds, it would spoil in just a few days. However, how could such a broth arise in inanimate nature (after all, Pasteur and other physiologists received and receive it for their experiments from a decoction of meat and other products)?

Popular at the beginning of the 20th century, A. I. Oparin’s hypothesis about the origin of life on Earth as a result of the spontaneous formation of the simplest organic molecules that made up the first living organisms is now almost not mentioned due to the complete lack of experimental evidence.

The theory of evolution is usually associated with the name of Charles Darwin, although his book On the Origin of Species (1859) makes no statements about the actual emergence of new species from previously existing ones. This kind of statement appears several years later in the public lectures of Thomas Huxley, who actively promoted and advertised the new “great teaching of the master of genius.” It was Huxley who began to argue that man descended from apes. Charles Darwin himself always called evolution through natural selection a hypothesis, calling for the search for missing intermediate links in the “fossil record.” Later verified excavations finally refuted the existence of such links. A huge number of remains of plants and animals have been found, but they are all clearly divided into two groups: giant trilobites, dinosaurs, ferns, and next to and often mixed with them are the bones of modern mammals, fish and reptiles. Fossil remains, rather, confirm the truth of the Bible's story about the Great Flood, when for several months the entire earth's surface was covered with water, and after its retreat, the climate of the earth and the composition of the creatures living on it became completely different (post-flood). How else can we explain the huge cemeteries of frozen mammoths with fresh green grass in their stomachs found in Siberia and similar mass concentrations of giant reptiles called dinosaurs? The founder of paleontology, the Frenchman J. Cuvier, who first discovered these fossils, considered his findings to be convincing and visual evidence of the flood.

Another argument of evolutionists is radioisotope methods of dating rocks and remains of organisms. But, firstly, what should be considered the “age” of a piece of stone? Didn’t he exist at all before his appearance?! Secondly, to determine any period of time by changing the ratio of isotopes, you need to know their initial ratios, and also be sure that these isotopes did not come from the external environment. Neither one nor the other condition is actually met. Therefore, isotope dating can be more or less reliably carried out only on samples of certain species (plant remains, for example) if there are standards with dating known by other methods. In practice, this is done for intervals of several hundred or, at most, thousands of years. All age determinations that give intervals of tens of thousands or millions of years are obtained by indirect methods with a priori assumptions about the past; in particular, it is believed that there was no flood. The scientific validity of such results is zero.

On the other hand, there are many facts in favor of the fact that life on earth and the Earth itself exist for a very short time. Thus, the Earth’s magnetic field has noticeably decreased since its first measurement by K. Gauss 140 years ago. Thus, in a few hundred years it will no longer be able to create radiation belts that protect life on Earth from destructive streams of cosmic particles. Moving backward in time, 100 thousand years ago we would have had such a strong magnetic field, which is now artificially created in some physical installations and which is incompatible with life. In addition, the cause and mechanism of generation of the Earth's magnetic field, as well as the structure of the Earth's interior, remain unknown. The interesting drawings presented in the books, “The Earth in cross-section, like a watermelon,” are only schematic models built on the basis of indirect data.

Many other phenomena on Earth also indicate its youth. By the rate of accumulation of sediments and salts carried by large rivers into the seas, by the small content of helium in the atmosphere, which should have been formed in significant quantities during the radioactive decay of uranium, by the preservation of gas deposits of very high pressure in the bowels of the Earth, which should fall from -due to seepage through porous rocks, the age of the Earth cannot exceed one hundred thousand years. There are even more obvious and, one might say, glaring facts. So no one has yet managed to discover a single trunk of a sequoia tree that died a “natural death”, but the age of existing giant sequoias reaches up to 6 thousand years!

Further, it is known that many birds find islands in the ocean by the location of the stars, which in itself is amazing. But the Earth’s axis moves along the stellar sphere and 20 thousand years ago was directed not to the North Star, but to Vega. It is impossible to believe that the instinct inherent in the genetic apparatus of the chick could track this displacement of the axis, but otherwise the birds would not be able to regularly fly across the ocean for the winter.

Modern astrophysics claims that our Sun has been shining for billions of years due to the energy of continuous thermonuclear fusion in its depths. There is even a “standard” model of the Sun, in which everything is described in detail. This model assumes that for every particle of light (photon) there should be several special elementary particles (neutrinos), which do not come from the surface of the Sun, but directly from the region of nuclear reactions. In the 1960s, a large scientific program to detect solar neutrinos was launched. The difficulty was that neutrinos penetrate enormous layers of matter with extraordinary ease (the globe almost does not stop them), and therefore special bulky detectors are needed to register them, placed in deep shafts. After thirty years of observation, it was recognized that the actual neutrino flux was ten times weaker than the theoretical value. This gap indicates the inconsistency of the hypothesis. Experts, however, hope that solving the problem of solar neutrinos will give impetus to a future “new breakthrough.”

Cosmology (the science of the Universe) is currently dominated by the Big Bang theory, which arose in the 1920s and later received some indirect confirmation. Its authors, of course, were awarded Nobel Prizes in physics. According to the currently accepted (again, “standard”) model, the Universe began its existence “out of nothing” approximately 15 billion years ago from a state of infinite density and temperature. Now it is expanding and cooling. But the quantitative characteristics of these processes have been little studied, because confident conclusions would require observations for at least a billion years! There are many scientific schools that interpret the “evolution” of stars and the Universe in different ways and, accordingly, estimate their age. In general, it should be noted that only nearby stars can be observed in sufficient detail. Most stars are grouped in nebulae (galaxies), the sizes and distances to which are determined only by indirect methods. At the same time, most modern cosmologists are convinced that there was some “beginning”, although they do not have clear ideas about the nature of this “beginning” and the “scenario of development.” The recently emerged new-fangled theory of inflation suggests that in the past the expansion rate of the Universe could have been completely different, and therefore the duration of the expansion could be significantly less than current hypothetical estimates.

To summarize the above, we can state that modern science to some extent confirms what the Bible teaches, but in many ways it does not agree with Christianity. This should not and cannot confuse believers, among whom there have always been many natural scientists, since the scientific picture of the world itself is very incomplete and changeable. One of the teachers of the Church, Basil the Great, spoke about this back in the 4th century. He did not advise Orthodox Christians either to rely on scientific data to substantiate their faith in Christ the Savior, or to try to refute them, since “scientists constantly refute themselves.”