Elsewhere, @Rob asks, "could you provide any evidence [of Creationism?] which is not from a religious text?"

...and I already did so, above. (@Rob, it wasn't entirely clear if you're asking about extra-biblical evidence of Creation[ism], or of the Resurrection. There is plenty of the latter as well; I can point you at some videos and/or books if you like.)

@Matthew Okay, I'll be honest that I'm a bit confused about the Nye vs Ham (I haven't time at the moment to watch it all, but I will shortly) discussion... would tracks not be washed away during a flood?

Regarding dating, how old do you believe the earth to be?

I should probably clarify; I'm an atheist whose stance is 'God might exist', but there is no reason to believe the Christian god exists. That's quite different from 'God does not exist'.

So, I am willing to accept evidence pointing towards a god, but I am not willing to accept religious texts (without unbiased verification) as more solid proof than other texts (without unbiased verification).

I am honestly unaware of any first-hand texts (christian or not) which describe the miracles of jesus. These seems to all be written generations after the fact

But, let's address the flood and datings first

@Matthew I'd like a bit of clarification about this. Radioactive decay depends on the mass of the object. Where have you obtained the ~100,000 year figure from?

@Rob It depends. Given enough time, yes. Actually, that we have any fossilized tracks is already evidence that the lower layer was buried quickly and while it was still wet, because millions of years of weathering would erase them. What would need to happen is for the sediment to be semi-wet (think "clay") and then quickly buried so it isn't exposed to water for very long.

As for the age of the Earth... about 6,000 years. There are many evidences that it is not much older; ocean salinity, the recession of the Moon, the decaying magnetic field. This page gives some highlights. IIRC, Ham mentions several of these in the debate, as well.

Noah's Flood is also the best explanation for world-wide deposition of the many rock layers that are observed. If you look at folded rocks, there strong evidence they were folded while still malleable (namely, that they haven't metamorphosed). Anyone that's played with clay or similar knows that semi-solid "rock" bends quite easily before it solidifies. "Massive heat and pressure" are claimed to be able to do this also, but would leave other evidence that we don't see.

There's an interesting video on this here. So that eliminates the hypothesis that these rock layers were deposited over millions of years. Yet we also see these layers spanning multiple continents, which disproves them being the product of any local event. Ergo, a global flood is the only feasible explanation. (There are many other evidences also, but this one is fairly easy to understand as well as fairly conclusive IMNSHO.)

@Matthew Thank you for the links, I'll go through them tomorrow (it's nearly 6am here).

If I could find a counter argument that could explain your above points without a global flood, would you perhaps be swayed towards believing it may have a non supernatural explanation?

And I don't mean believing it was a natural occurrence, but merely believing it may be possible?

In other words, I'm willing to believe there may have been a global flood, but I'm not convinced. Is there a possibility we could maybe meet half way once reviewing the above?

@Rob TBH, I don't know the derivation of the ~100ky figure, just that it's the figure that is always cited in Creationist literature. That said, the half-life of ¹⁴C is ~5ky, so after 100ky, you'd have ~0.0001% of the starting ¹⁴C. If you start with a Mole (14g) of ¹⁴C (for which you'd need 10¹⁰ kg of C!), in only 400ky you would have a single atom. I think that works out to ~1 atom of ¹⁴C left in a 1kg sample of carbon after ~100-150ky.

@Rob First, I'd dispute whether Noah's Flood was, strictly speaking, supernatural (there's a very long book on that here). Second, the "problem" isn't so much that I believe an alternate explanation is impossible, but rather that I believe that a myriad of evidences across many fields results in an overwhelming probability that the Biblical account is correct. IOW, you would have to disprove the Bible.

Disproving the entire bible is unfortunately biting off more than I can chew. But given the fact that there are (as you said) over 300 legends describing a flood: 1) Do they all agree on the same time? 2) Do they all agree on the same biblical reason? (If not, how is that proof of the Christian god)?

Oh... another problem with radiometric dating is that the rate of decay may have changed. There's actually evidence that appears to suggest that this happened; see RATE vol 1 and vol 2. IIRC, these also cite some of the issues with Uniformitarian interpretations of "dating".

I have not personally studied the flood legends (there's a book out there which I haven't read; I can probably find it if you're interested). I wouldn't say they're "proof", though, in any case, merely evidence. They make sense if Noah's Flood really happened. They're a puzzle if it didn't. Some have certainly been corrupted in the details.

You said that it's not supernatural, but if it did happen, surely the water went somewhere. There isn't enough water left to flood the earth as described by noah's flood

So, it must have disappeared, that is, a supernatural event. How would it not be supernatural?

The best proof of the Christian God, specifically, is perhaps Christ. There is excellent evidence that He existed, that He was crucified, and that His body went missing in a way that's nearly impossible to explain from a purely naturalistic worldview. Christianity is the only religion with a resurrected founder. It's also the only religion in which you cannot earn your own salvation. I consider those two facts to be... not proof, but extremely compelling.

When you add to that how science agrees with the Bible, well...

Jesus didn't found any religion, nor is he the first person people claim to have resurrected

Or am I missing something?

@Rob Hardly! There's enough water right now to cover the ground (if you smooth out all the bumps) to a depth of, IIRC, >2 miles. The water didn't disappear; "the valleys sank" (Psalm 104:8) and made room for the water to run off the land.

@Rob Okay, who would you describe as the "founder" of Christianity? (Saying "God" is cheating 😉.)

@Matthew That's plainly not true. Even if all the ice caps melted we wouldn't even cover elevated cities

@Matthew Well, I'm not a scholar, but those who wrote the bible did so at least one generation after jesus

@Rob You missed the part about "if you smooth out all the bumps". I forget offhand what the difference in elevation is between the Marianas Trench and Everest, but it's a lot 🙂.

(that wasn't a dig, I'm honestly not extremely well versed in the history of the bible despite attending a religious school)... but so far as I know none of the authors of the bible existed at that time

@Rob That's not true. Parts were written (Paul's letters, IIRC) ~55 AD, and Paul spoke to the Apostles ~35 AD. There's a really great video on this I watched recently; I'll try to find it again.

@Matthew That is fair... but it also assumes no mountains existed during Noah's time

Did he not climb a mountain to build the boat?

...and even so, do you believe other historical accounts of Rome, circa 0 AD? What about Napoleon? We have better history of Jesus than we do of a lot of historical figures that aren't contentious.

Would I believe historical accounts of Rome which only served to paint Rome in a good light? No

That's an honest answer

@Rob AFAIK the Bible doesn't say that. You're probably thinking of him landing on a mountain. Anyway, the Bible says the waters prevailed over the land only a "modest" distance (~50 ft, I think, or something on that order of magnitude anyway... but a lot less than a mile!). So the Earth was just less bumpy before the Flood.

Same as I would be skeptical about any account of anything which was clearly biased in a certain direction

@Rob Have you read the Bible? Peter denied Jesus. David was a murderer. The first witnesses were women. The Bible gives you the straight story. There are many things that would be told differently if it was biased.

I have read the bible, yes. I was sent to a catholic school

But debating the accuracy of the bible extends quite a bit further, which I'm not so versed in

The fact that the authors were somehow not perfect (not sure why women is related?) doesn't really add credence in my eyes

@Rob Women in that time were not credible witnesses

But we are discussing it today, not in that time

Anyway, I am sorry if I sound somewhat combative... I tend to be terse when discussing topics

Yes, but what matters is when that bit was recorded. That they were the first witnesses of the Resurrection was an embarrassment. If someone was making up the Resurrection, it is unlikely they would have women as the first witnesses unless it was true.

I hope I do not come across as offensive

In any case, I need to head to bed - I'll come back and see if I can go through your links (given I have time)

Good night!

Nah, actually you're much more reasonable than the typical devotee to Naturalism/Materialism! Thanks for that 🙂.

Yup, get some sleep! I'll leave some more links for later...