The evening session today focused on four areas as indicated in the title.
Biblical Genetics - Dr. John Sanford. Dr. Sanford announced that he is refocusing his ministry toward working with the next generation to battle the anything-goes in sexuality, which is destroying humanity, and anything-goes madness in schools, which is destroying the next generation. Hence, his creation work in genetics will diminish.
For this talk, however, he described the work of a team of biologists using the premise that "good science affirms scripture". His work, over the years has been on genetic entropy (that we are devolving rather than evolving). He referenced a secular research paper where the author, who has spent years researching E-Coli bacteria, concluded that his E-Coli experiments have shown "reductive evolution". Which means the loss of information (e.g. genetic entropy).
Dr. Rob Carter traced mitochondrial DNA to one woman in 2007, the biblical Eve. He made the comment that "we have her DNA".
Another study developed a robust way of asserting that Adam and Eve can have the genetic diversity to be the parents of all people.
Finally, he announced the formation of a new group called BIDG (see picture below) to continue creation biological studies with a new generation of scientists.
2. Paleontology - Dr. Kurt Wise. Dr. Wise spoke on Paleontology in Creationism, Past, Present, Future. He stated that fossils provide a window into organisms of the past and processes of the past. Baraminological studies on fossil organisms and living organisms look the same. This is indicative of the lack of differences between the same organisms before the flood and after the flood.
He cautioned that we not use the argument that marine fossils on the top of the mountains are proof of the flood. This is because the mountains were lifted up, so the marine fossils formed before the uplift. However, fossils in undisturbed sediments 1,000 above the current sea level can be used as evidence of the flood.
3. Education - Dr. Matt McLain. Dr. McLain spoke on the "Current state of Creation Education." His talk focused on creationist colleges and universities. Specifically, colleges and universities that offer science degrees. His search, which he cautioned may not have been exhaustive, identified 13 creationist colleges and universities that offer science degrees (see picture below). When he broke them down into the various science disciplines, the pickings got even slimmer with no creationist colleges or universities offering degrees in Astronomy and Meteorology. His point being that we need more creationist colleges and universities and more degree programs in the existing creationist colleges and universities. We also need more jobs for creationist trained graduates and better prepare them for secular related jobs that are available if a creationist job is not available.
4. Chemistry - Dr. Aaron Hutchison. Dr. Hutchison noted that there is not a lot of chemistry research in creationism and focused on two areas where Chemists have a role to play. One is that chemistry can be used to "form rocks correctly". When a geologist looks at a rock, the Geologist sees minerals. When Dr. Hutchison looks at a rock, he sees chemical compounds and can help in understanding the formation of the rock with respect to the solubility of those compounds.
The other role chemists can play is in the area of isotopic studies (i.e., radiometric decay). Chemists can approach each isotope individually with respect to chemical markers. The bottom line of his presentation is that there is a place for chemists in creationism.
If you would like to contribute to our travel expenses, you can go to https://give.cornerstone.cc/creationeducation.
God Bless,
Dr. Rich Overman