[theophilus]

A physician who has made a complete examination of a person without having been told his age could probably make an accurate estimate of it because of his knowledge of how the aging process works. But what would happen if he were to travel back in time and examine Adam and Eve before the fall and was then asked to estimate their age? Because they were created to live forever they wouldn’t have undergone the same aging process we do today. If he examined them just a few days after their creation he would give a high estimate of their ages because they would appear to be the same as adults he had examined in the past. If enough time had elapsed he might give a low estimate because they would look younger than people of a corresponding age he had examined in the past.

Suppose he went back to some time after the fall and examined them. Now they would be aging the same way we do today. If he was unaware of their past history he would make an estimate based on the assumption that they had been born in the same way as everyone else. (I know that people lived longer then so in this example I am assuming that the doctor was aware of this fact and took it into consideration.) His estimate of their age would probably be off but whether it was too high or too low would depend on how much time elapsed between their creation and their fall.

Scientists who try to discover the age of the earth usually begin by assuming that the natural processes which are occurring now have been going on since the formation of the world and that there has never been any kind of divine intervention. One of these natural processes is the conversion of uranium into lead by radioactive decay. The rate at which this takes place is known so if a rock sample contains both lead and uranium it is possible to calculate how long it would take to for the lead to have formed as a result of this process. Of course this calculation assumes that all of the lead in the rock was once uranium.

But what if the Biblical account of creation is true? Then scientists who try to measure the earth’s age are in the same position as the doctor in the second example. They wouldn’t be able to make an accurate measurement unless they knew how much of the lead was the result of radioactive decay and how much was part of the original creation. The same thing is true of any other process used to try to determine the earth’s age.