I was surprised to find out that kbertsche accepts that YECs can find oil with just the basic idea of relative dating and knowledge of the morphology of the rocks. This was said in an off-topic exchange on the thread about YEC views of
scientific dating, where he said:
... Though it is somewhat surprising to me, apparently oil exploration can be done without use of absolute (scientific, radiometric) dates. I agree that a YEC can find oil.
I've argued for this idea many times against the position of most here that finding oil requires the use of Old Earth dating, so of course I'm happy to have some agreement for a change.
But he went on about his friend Glenn Morton, who gave up his YEC beliefs for the Old Earth point of view based on what he considered to be geological facts he was becoming aware of.
But as Glenn found, to remain a YEC while doing oil exploration requires one to deny the huge amount of evidence for earth history that one starts to uncover while doing his job.
I would have liked to continue the discussion some but since it's off topic in that thread it has to be continued somewhere else. There are many threads where this subject has come up, so this could be put into one of them as Mods decide, but I couldn't decide myself so started a new topic.
Maybe the issues Morton raises at
his own website could be the basis for a new thread, starting with his article
Why I Left Young-Earth Creationism.
I strongly believe that Morton has misinterpreted the data he found so compelling, but I doubt anyobe here will agree with me as usual. Just for one issue, he is convinced by seismic imaging that he sees canyons deep in the rocks that would require a long time to carve out:
One also finds erosional canyons buried in the earth. These canyons would require time to excavate, just like the time it takes to erode the Grand Canyon.
But this sounds like someone who never did have the YEC point of view on the Grand Canyon, rather someone who accepts the Old Earth idea that it must have taken a lot of time to carve it. I don't know what various YECs have concluded about how much time it took, but I've argued here many times that it was probably formed by the receding Flood waters rushing into cracks in the uppermost strata, chunks of the strata providing abrasion along with the rushing water. How long that would take to erode away 277 miles of canyon to a depth of one mile and a width at some points of eighteen miles I'm not sure, but it wouldn't take millions of years.
And I also object to the idea that a canyon seen on seismic imaging deep underground was ever at the surface. I'd expect it to have been carved by rushing water running underground between the strata also at the end of the Flood when the strata were still soft.
Of course Morton raises many other issues at his website besides this.
I am still, however, very happy that someone agrees with me about old earth dating not being necessary to finding oil. Yahoo to that.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.