Secularists Say Landscapes Can Form in Days?

Secular researchers are frequently realizing that landforms can form suddenly, in a matter of days even, as a result of catastrophic events and that millions of years are not required.

Researchers studying Europe’s most powerful waterfall and the canyon containing it reportedly reached the conclusion that they were “created in a matter of days by extreme flooding.” Rather than being the result of slow-and-gradual processes, these researchers believe that a series of extreme floods several thousand years apart formed the waterfall and the canyon catastrophically. They say that these “findings demonstrate the long-term impact that extreme flood events can have on landscapes.”

The leader of the study apparently stated, “We think of natural environments as being formed over thousands of years, but sometimes they are shaped very suddenly. This insight into one of Iceland's magnificent landscapes helps us better understand these processes, and illustrates their legacy."

Of course, we have already known that because the Bible tells us that we live on a young Earth. Geological features cannot take millions of years to form slowly and gradually because the planet isn’t that old! When we start with the Bible we know that we live on a young Earth that was radically reshaped by a massive catastrophe, the global Flood. The Flood and its aftermath explain many of the geologic features we see today.

Our resident geologist, Dr. Andrew Snelling, commented on the study:

This is a brief reminder that even uniformitarians are finding that the actual observational data can only explain the formation of landforms such as canyons and massive waterfalls by catastrophic floods, not the present-day slow-and-gradual geologic processes. Of course we disagree on the timescale, but agree this canyon and waterfall in Iceland were carved after the Ice Age, the one short Ice Age that occurred after the Genesis Flood.  And rather than floods being thousands of years apart, they would have been only years to decades apart. Of course, this canyon formed in hardened basalt layers in contrast to the soften volcanic ash layers at Mount St. Helens, but it still resulted from catastrophic floods which carved through the solid rock as though it were soft!

Geologic features do not take millions of years to form! They can form quickly under the right conditions. The global Flood of Noah’s day and its aftermath formed the perfect conditions for many of the geological features that we see around us today. There is no need to appeal to millions of years to explain features such as this waterfall and canyon in Iceland or the Grand Canyon or any other geologic feature. We can trust God’s Word from the very beginning.

If you want to read the most comprehensive books on creationist geology, then I urge you to obtain the two-volume set, Earth’s Catastrophic Past. This huge set is filled with up-to-date geological evidence that demonstrates the accuracy of the Bible’s account of creation and the Flood.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

 

This item was written with the assistance of AiG’s research team.