Science in the Bible

In his 1893 encyclical (world-wide letter) Providentissimus Deus (Latin for “The Most Provident God”), Pope Leo XIII proclaimed,

“All the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical [official], are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost [Spirit]. … By supernatural power, He [God/the Holy Spirit] so moved and impelled them [the biblical authors] to write—He was so present to them—that the things which He ordered, and those only, they, first, rightly understood, then willed faithfully to write down, and finally expressed in apt words and with infallible truth.” (Para. 20)

Probably all Christian denominations endorse such doctrine. The pope then continues,

“Let them [scholars] loyally hold that God, the Creator and Ruler of all things, is also the Author of the Scriptures—and that therefore nothing can be proved either by physical science or archaeology which can really contradict the Scriptures.” (Para. 23, emphasis mine)

Moreover, in their book The Bible: God’s Word or Man’s, Jehovah’s Witnesses also contend,

“In essential features, the Bible is in harmony with modern science. Where there is a conflict between the two, the scientists’ evidence is questionable. Where they agree, the Bible is often so accurate that we have to believe it got its information from a superhuman [divine] intelligence.” (p. 116)

Creationists’ belief in the Bible is even more radical than the above. In his article “Science at the Bar—Causes for Concern” science philosopher Larry Laudan describes Creationism as follows:

“The creationists say that the earth is of very recent origin (say 6,000 … years old); they argue that most of the geological features of the earth’s surface are diluvial in character (i.e., products of the postulated Noachian deluge [flood]); they are committed to a large number of factual historical claims with which the Old Testament is replete; they assert the limited variability of species. They are committed to the view that, since [according to the Bible] animals and man were created at the same time, the human fossil record must be paleontologically co-extensive with the record of lower animals.”

More specifically, creationists believe that the universe and the earth have only existed around 6,000 years, because that’s what it adds up to in the biblical accounts of past human generations in the book of Genesis and Luke’s gospel (3:23–38). They argue that most of the earth’s geological features are the result of a great flood, as described in Genesis, which allegedly happened around 4,500 years ago. For example, they believe that dinosaurs and people lived together at some time, because Genesis says that all animals and man were created within days of each other. They therefore conclude that the human fossil record must overlap that of all the other animals, since they also deny large scale evolution—termed macroevolution.

This article discusses the validity or otherwise of several of the above religious claims.

For the benefit of the reader who might not be familiar with the Bible, the Genesis account of the Creation, of the earth and the universe, may be summarized as follows. Day 1: God created light: separating night and day. Day 2: God created a dome (the Hebrews thought the sky was a shiny, metal dome) to separate the rain water from the sea waters. Day 3: God gathered the sea waters together into one place, a sort-of basin, so that dry land could appear. He then endowed the land with vegetation: both plants and trees. Day 4: God created the sun, moon, and stars: he placed them inside the dome he had created on the second day to give light to the earth. Day 5: God created fish, sea animals, sea crawlers, birds, and other flying animals. Day 6: God created tame and wild land animals, land crawlers, insects, and finally humans. (Genesis 1:3–26)

The Sky Dome

Now, most Bible-inerrancy believers question the creation of a solid dome (vault or canopy) on the second day. The Roman Catholic New American Bible (NAB) clearly states, “God said: ‘Let there be a dome in the middle of the waters, to separate one body of water from the other.’ God made the dome and it separated the water below the dome from the water above the dome.” [Genesis 1:6–7 (NAB), emphasis mine] Moreover, in a footnote, it has, “Dome: the [original] Hebrew word suggests a gigantic metal dome.” [Genesis 1:7n (NAB)]

In the interest of fairness, however, in their New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (NWT), Jehovah’s Witnesses have, “God said: ‘Let there be an expanse [a space] between the waters, and let there be a division between the waters and the waters.’ Then God went on to make the expanse and divided the waters beneath the expanse from the waters above the expanse.” [Genesis 1:6–7 (NWT), emphasis mine]

However, when this Bible version comes to Noah’s Flood, it has no problem rendering the text: “on that day all the springs of the vast watery deep burst open and the floodgates of the heavens [sky] were opened.” [Genesis 7:11 (NWT), emphasis mine] And again, after the flood ended, it has, “The springs of the watery deep and the floodgates of the heavens were stopped up, so the rain from the heavens [sky] stopped falling.” [Genesis 8:2 (NWT), emphasis mine] Needless to mention, an expanse or a space has no floodgates to open and shut: so, it is an imagined solid construction, which, in reality, does not exist in the sky. Are these floodgates metaphorical? No. Why not? How could an expanse or space hold water above it? It was not clouds but water that was allegedly above the dome: the clouds, as well as the celestial bodies, were allegedly below the dome. And, water would fall to the ground unless it was held up by something solid.

Besides, in the book of Job, one of Job’s friends, Elihu, asks him, “Can you, with him [God], spread out (or ‘beat out’) the skies as solid as a metal mirror?” [Job 37:18 (NWT), emphasis mine] Please note, here, that this is Jehovah’s Witnesses’ own translation. In other words, the ancient Hebrews thought that the sky was something like a solid, shiny, metal mirror. Until one realizes this, many biblical passages will simply not make much sense: see, for example, Daniel 4:11, quoted below.

Moreover, in the story of the tower of Babel, people wanted to build a tower reaching up to heaven. The King James Version (KJV) has,

“They [the people] said, ‘Go to [Come], let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven.’” [Genesis 11:4 (KJV), emphasis mine] How is this conceivably possible unless “heaven” was something like a dome? (Please refer to the “Biblical Cosmology” picture at the beginning of this article.)

So, right off the bat, it does not seem that the Bible is very scientific, right? There is nothing in the sky but a layer of air. Bible-inerrancy believers render the original Hebrew word for ‘the sky’ in Genesis as an “expanse” or a “space” only in hindsight because they know it is scientific nonsense. As I cited above, “the Hebrew word suggests a gigantic metal dome.”

I once heard a televangelist quote the above verse from Job: “Can you, with him [God], spread out the skies?” [Job 37:18 (NWT)] (it could have been a similar passage: e.g., Isaiah 40:22, 42:5, 42:22, 44:24, 45:12, 51:13; Jeremiah 10:12, 51:15; Job 26:7; Psalms 104:2; Zechariah 12:1), arguing that the Bible knew about the big bang theory. The phrase “spread out,” or “stretch out,” he claimed, referred to the expansion of space. But this is quoting the verse out of context: in fact, Jehovah’s Witnesses give an alternate phrase here, “beat out,” which is more in line with the concept of its being made of metal. This is the kind of danger we fall into when we try to read things in the Bible that are not there. Keep in mind that God is always on the side of truth, and truth does not rely on falsehood for support. God does not need us to manipulate the truth for his sake: he can take care of his own interests.

Creation of the Earth and the Universe

According to Genesis, the earth (the land and the seas) was created first and then the sun, moon, and stars: which the biblical author visualized stuck to the inside of a solid, metal dome covering the earth, like lamps to a ceiling, to give light to the earth. These celestial bodies were also thought to be much smaller than the earth, especially the stars, which were thought to be the size of figs, say: biblical authors thought they could all fall on earth and still the earth would survive. For example, in the King James Version, Matthew’s gospel portrays Jesus saying,

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” [Matthew 24:29–30 (KJV), emphasis mine]

Jehovah’s Witnesses have practically the same translation here; so, it makes things simpler. The stars are like our sun, but they are very far away, and so they appear very small. If only a single star were to fall on earth, there would be no “tribes” left “mourn” on earth. According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the United States of America, the sun’s diameter is more than one hundred times that of the earth, which means that more than a million earths can fit into our sun; moreover, our sun is an average-sized star: there are stars even up to a hundred times larger.

Unlike what the Bible says, a starry universe first came into existence, the sun was then formed, and finally the planets—including the earth and the moon. According to the Bible, it was the other way around: the earth was formed first, then the sun and the moon, and finally the stars. I hope the reader can appreciate the scientific shortcomings in the Bible by now. Still, Jehovah’s Witnesses insist that where there is disagreement between science and the Bible, the Bible trumps science, while Catholics also insist that there cannot be contradictions between the sciences and the Bible. With such an attitude towards science, religion will soon be ruled out of our schools by the state because it confuses children: we would not even be able to teach our children the existence of God!

Some people might perceive a textual contradiction in Genesis chapter 1 because it says that light was created in the first day while the sun, moon, and stars were created on the fourth day. They argue it is impossible because all our light comes from the sun (and possibly the stars). This might be true to some extent, but what actually happened first, in the big bang, is that the entire universe was filled with electromagnetic waves, and I think the best way to describe them to ordinary people is by the word “light,” which is the form of electromagnetic waves we are most familiar with and most descriptive. Was the big bang revealed in the bible before the scientists knew about it then? I think it is more of a coincidence that the Bible turned out to be so right. It might have been amazing if everything else in the Bible were somehow always found to be correct, but, as we shall see in the course of this article, this is most probably not the case.

Now, light, as opposed to darkness, was considered a divine or semi-divine substance. So, it is natural for the Bible to portray God creating light first. In fact, in the Nicene Creed (381 CE) we profess that Jesus is “God from God, [and] Light from Light,” which is nonsense because light, like all other forms of energy, is strictly a physical quantity—not a divine or supernatural.

Age of the Earth and the Universe

According to the biblical account in Genesis, God created the earth (the land and the seas) on the third day, and he created the sun, moon, and stars on the fourth day. This means that the universe and the earth were created within a day of each other: so, one might say that they are practically the same age according to the Bible. This implies that if we can find the age of the earth, we have practically found the age of the universe as well. Luckily, in chapter 3 of Luke’s gospel we have the complete genealogy of Jesus back to Adam (the first human created). Genesis also tells us how long most of these ancestors lived and how old their parents were when they were born. This way, one can laboriously find out how long before Jesus Adam was created, and since Adam was created on the sixth day of the Creation, if we add to this amount of time the two-thousand-odd years from Jesus to the present time, we can find roughly the age of the earth and the universe.

This calculation was done by an archbishop of the Church of Ireland, James Ussher, in 1654: he determined that the earth was created in 4004 BCE. There were others who did similar calculations: all came up to around 4,000 years from the Creation to the birth of Jesus. This is why creationists believe that the earth and the universe are only around 6,000 years old. Strangely enough, in their brochure “Was Life Created?,” Jehovah’s Witnesses disagree with creationists in this respect. They try to conform to modern science by contending that the Creation days were not 24-hour days; they were thousands, millions, possibly even billions of years long. Meanwhile, Genesis mentions “evening and morning,” after every “day” of the Creation, that is, not just once but six times. (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, 31) I don’t know how Jehovah’s Witnesses could possibly be so blind! Such an attitude undermines their credibility. Outlandish interpretations of the Scriptures are not what the Bible actually says.

Now, what does science say concerning the age of the universe? Scientists have discovered that the universe has been expanding ever since it came into existence. The distance between galaxies is increasing in every direction you look: all the galaxies in the universe are receding from one another. Suppose you partially blow up a balloon, and paint dots all over its surface. If you then keep blowing up the balloon, relative to any dot you like, all the other dots will separate from it proportionally to their original distance. This is what is happening to all the galaxies around us—in every direction. This means that space in the universe is expanding all around us: just like the balloon surface was expanding on blowing it up further. But how do scientists measure the receding rate of these galaxies? They use equipment similar to what traffic police use to determine your driving speed. It is a little bit more complicated, but the concept is the same—termed Doppler shift. This way scientists know at what rate space in the universe is expanding. If one were to reverse this expansion rate, one would find that the universe started from a very small size around 14 billion years ago. A far cry from 6 thousand years ago, as allegedly “revealed” in the Bible! To put this in perspective, this is analogous to science saying that a year is about 365 days long while the Bible says it is less than 14 seconds long. There is no way science could be that far out: scientists claim only an error of far less than 1% in their measurement.

Is it possible that the scientists are wrong and the Bible right? Well, there are other phenomena supporting the big bang theory, like the microwave background radiation, but I don’t wish the reader to be confused with too much information. Moreover, supernovas (explosions of stars at the end of their life cycle) are very bright, outshining an entire galaxy, so they enable us to measure the actual distance to the oldest galaxies: dividing their distance by the speed of light tells us how old those galaxies are. Suffice it here to say that the big bang theory is practically cast in stone, like the heliocentric theory—the fact that the earth and the planets orbit the sun.

Admittedly, there are some scientific theories that are very shaky, in my opinion, like string theory and the multiverse theory, and others that are continuously debated, like the theory of evolution, but not the heliocentric theory or the big bang theory. I would even dare say that all scientists agree with both of them: they are pretty much cast in stone. Besides, the big bang theory is a theory which supports a “moment of creation”: in other words, if Bible believers contest it, they would effectively be shooting themselves in the foot. It is probably the only scientific theory that, in some way, really supports something of what the Bible says. Albeit, as I showed in my article “God of the Gaps?,” the Bible does not endorse creation from nothingness.

Now, when it comes to the age of the earth, unlike trying to determine the age of the universe, we have an advantage: we are on earth. Luckily, we still happen to have some naturally-occurring radioactive elements on earth. These are unstable chemical elements that change into other elements spontaneously: like uranium-238, thorium-232, potassium-40, and uranium-235. Now, by “changing,” I do not mean forming compounds, but literally changing from one element to another: from uranium to lead, say. Chemical compounds are formed by various ways of sharing the electrons orbiting the nuclei of atoms. Radioactivity consists of a decay of the nucleus of atoms; that is, a change in the number of protons and/or neutrons in the nucleus take place: normally the chemical element changes. Imagine if we could change lead into gold—no such luck—but you get the point.

What is wonderful about radioactive elements is that their decay rate is not affected by the physical conditions surrounding them, not even temperature—their half-life remains practically constant. The half-life is the time it takes for half the quantity of a radioactive element to change to another element (or isotope). Now if a radioactive element is trapped in a rock of lava, say, when it solidifies, that rock behaves like an hourglass: where the top flask represents the parent element and the bottom flask represents the daughter element. If we can measure the relative amounts of parent element to daughter element in various small samples taken from that rock we can determine the time when that rock solidified. Science believes the earth was molten initially, so we cannot really measure the age of the earth, as such, but we can tell that it is older than the age determined by radiogenic measurements. Now, admittedly, contamination by daughter, or even parent, element after solidification is a pain in the neck in these measurements, but with care they can be worked around: usually by comparing two radioactive elements, with different half-lives, that happen to be in the same rock. The ages obtained from the two radiogenic measurements must verify one another, of course. Such a scenario practically rules out contamination.

Anyway, to make a long story short, the earth’s age, as determined by radiogenic measurements seems to be more than 4.5 billion years. To put this in perspective, this is analogous to science saying the year is about 365 days long and the Bible saying that it is only about 42 seconds long. (Or, if you like, the distance half-way round the globe along the equator is about 20,000 kilometers—about a 22-hour continuous flight on a commercial airplane—but creationists insist it is only about 27 meters long—that’s less than a third of the length of an American football pitch.) Again, the error in measurement of the earth’s age by the radiogenic method is minimal—of the order of 1%. Indeed, in his article, Laudan continues, “It is fair to say that no one has shown how to reconcile such [creationists’] claims with the available evidence—evidence which speaks persuasively to a long earth history, among other things.”

So, how do creationists work around this huge discrepancy between the scientists’ estimates and the biblical estimates for the universe’s age and the earth’s age? They resort to a huge reduction in the speed of light at the beginning of the universe, starting almost infinite: thus making us think that the universe is very old while it is, in fact, very young. Of course, there is no scientific support for such a hypothesis. Besides, from Einstein’s most famous formula, E=mc² (where ‘E’ stands for energy, ‘m’ stands for mass—analogous to weight—and ‘c’ stands for the velocity of light in a vacuum) were the speed of light to decrease spontaneously, all created matter would lose energy spontaneously. But this contradicts one of the most basic principles of physics, that “energy cannot be created or destroyed” in our universe—it can only change form: from electricity to light and from light to heat, say. Were this to be the case, then matter and energy could disappear into nothingness and appear from nothingness: God would not be the only creator from nothingness.

And concerning radioactive-decay rates, creationists contend there was a similar huge reduction in radioactive activity. However, strangely enough the radioactive-decay rate of any substance is also related to the speed of light; in other words, if the radioactive-decay rates changed, the speed of light must also have changed proportionally: which we have just ruled out. In his book, In the Minds of Men, creationist, metallurgist Ian Taylor writes,

“The mechanics of radioactive decay are dealt with at length and in mathematical detail by specialist books on the subject, and it would not be appropriate to attempt to cover this topic here. Suffice it to say that radioactive decay depends on the probability of escape of certain particles from their orbit in the unstable atom. The decay rate is directly proportional to the speed of travel of the particles in their atomic orbit, and this speed is, in turn, directly proportional to the speed of light. It may seem odd that the speed of light is related to atomic phenomena, but it does turn up in a number of unlikely places as one of the universal constants. For instance, in the familiar expression E=mc², we find the velocity of light, c, related to the mass, m, and the energy, E.”

Because of such outlandish creationist claims, ‘Creationism’ is a derogatory term in scientific circles because creationists’ only, so called, scientific evidence is practically limited to quoting the Bible. Consequently, Creationism has also been called a ‘pseudoscience.’

Earth’s Shape and Motion

In conclusion, let us now have a quick look at what the Bible says regarding the shape of the earth, what causes day and night, and the relative movement of earth and sun. Science says the earth is spherical; day and night happen because the earth spins on its axis once daily, and the seasons happen because the earth orbits the sun once yearly—termed heliocentric theory—in a tilted fashion relative to its orbit. On the other hand, the Bible says the earth is flat; it contends that the sun rises in the east, sets in the west, and repositions itself through some underground path overnight; finally it argues that the sun moves round the earth in the sky (relative to the zodiac constellations) once a year—termed geocentric hypothesis. In other words, according to the Bible, the earth constitutes the center of the universe: it is fixed, and everything else moves around it. Although the Bible was written by several authors, luckily, its ‘cosmology’ happens to be consistent and similar to contemporaneous beliefs of nearby nations. In the heliocentric theory, the earth orbits the sun while, in the geocentric hypothesis, the sun moves around the earth. So, basically, in the former case the sun is fixed while, in the latter case, the earth is fixed. Now, have a look at the following biblical quotes.

(1) “Fear before him, all the earth: the world also shall be stable, that it be not moved.” [1 Chronicles 16:30 (KJV), emphasis mine]

(2) “The LORD reigneth, he is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, wherewith he hath girded himself: the world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.” [Psalms 93:1 (KJV), emphasis mine.]

(3) “Say among the heathen that the LORD reigneth: the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved.” [Psalms 96:10 (KJV), emphasis mine]

As mentioned, the heliocentric theory is practically cast in stone as a scientific theory. There are also verses that say the earth has foundations so it does not move:

(4) “Who [God] laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be removed for ever.” [Psalms 104:5 (KJV), emphasis mine]

(5) “Where wast thou [Job] when I [God] laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? Or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? Or who laid the corner stone thereof?” [Job 38:4–6 (KJV), emphasis mine] Note that the Bible has no clue how these imaginary foundations were anchored in the deep.

(6) “The burden of the word of the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, which [who] stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him.” [Zechariah 12:1 (KJV), emphasis mine]

I think Shadewald clinches the argument regarding the shape of the earth here by commenting, “If one views the earth as an architectural structure with floor, curtain walls, and a roof, it is natural to assume it has foundations (and, I might add, a cornerstone). Why a sphere would have foundations escapes me.” (See the “Biblical Cosmology” picture at the beginning of this article.) And there are also biblical verses that say the sun moves rather than the earth spins about its axis:

(7) “Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, ‘Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.’ So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the people had revenge upon their enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jasher? ‘So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day.’”[Joshua 10:12–13 (KJV), emphasis mine.]

(8) Also the Catholic canonical book The Wisdom of Ben Sira (or Ecclesiasticus) has, “Was it not by that same [Joshua’s] hand the sun stopped, and one day became two?” [Ben Sira 46:4 (NAB)]

Incidentally, this is the reason why Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) was condemned for heresy by the Catholic Church’s Inquisition and forced to recant his heliocentric theory.

Now, Bible-inerrancy believers naturally argue that the Bible does not say that the earth is flat because we have pictures of the earth from space missions showing it is definitely spherical. Besides scientists, this is a fact no sane person could possibly deny. Yet, the Bible does say that the earth is flat! In his article “The Flat-Earth Bible,” pseudoscience expert Robert Schadewald simply states, “The Bible is, from Genesis [the first book] to Revelation [the last book], a flat-earth book.” Have a look at the following passages.

(1) In the book of Daniel, King Nebuchadnezzar describes his dream as follows: “Thus were the visions of mine head in my bed; I saw, and behold a tree in the midst [middle/center (NAB)] of the earth, and the height thereof was great. The tree grew, and was strong, and the height thereof reached unto [the dome of] heaven, and the sight thereof to the end of all the earth.” [Daniel 4:10–11 (KJV), emphasis mine] Of course, the surface of a sphere has no “middle”.

(2) In the last of Jesus’s temptations in the desert, “Again, the devil took Him [Jesus] up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.” [Matthew 4:8 (KJV), emphasis mine]

(3) “Behold, He [Jesus] is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him.” [Revelation 1:7 (KJV), emphasis mine] People on the opposite side of the globe could not possibly see Jesus.

(4) “After these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree.” [Revelation 7:1 (KJV), emphasis mine] Needless to mention, a sphere has no corners.

(5) “When he uttereth his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens; and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth: he maketh lightnings with rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures.” [Jeremiah 51:16 (KJV), emphasis mine] Again, a sphere has no ends, either.

(6) “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” [Psalms 104:12 (KJV)] The east is only far from the west on a flat earth: on a spherical earth they actually meet each other, but this could be interpreted metaphorically.

(7) In the Genesis account of the Creation, on the third day of the Creation, “God said, ‘Let the waters under the heavens [dome (NAB)] be gathered together into one place [basin (NAB)], and let the dry land appear.’” [Genesis 1:9 (KJV)] This is not exactly what our earth looks like: this looks more like a flat piece of land with mountains on the sides and a pool of water in the middle. (See the “Biblical Cosmology” picture at the beginning of this article.)

How can all these verses make any sense unless the biblical authors considered the earth flat? However, in the interest of fairness, Bible-inerrancy believers point to the fact that the first quote is only a dream and the second is a vision: therefore, they do not have to bear any connection to reality. Still, regarding the second quote, I must disagree because the devil takes Jesus to a high mountain to be able to see the whole world from up there; he could have given him a slide show, say. I think the context implies a flat earth. Regarding the third quote, some televangelists believe that it predicts that Jesus’s return to earth will be televised globally: thus, every nation will see him coming. In the fourth quote, some Bible translations render “corners” as “quarters,” but there is not much one can say for the fifth quote. Consequently, if one looks at the Bible as a whole, as pseudoscience expert Schadewald concludes, “The Bible is, from Genesis to Revelation, a flat-earth book.” It explains all the verses above naturally.

In conclusion, one must admit that science hardly ever supports what the Bible says. This is why science and religion are skeptical of each other and practically always at odds with each other. So much, therefore, for the Bible’s infallibility claimed by the various religious institutions mentioned at the beginning of this article. Trying to defend the “science” in the Bible feels like clutching at straws: totally ineffective.

P.S. I’m afraid this article got too long: I had too much to say. I shall therefore address the theory of evolution and the fossil record in my next article. I must also postpone a discussion of the creationist hypotheses concerning Noah’s Flood to a separate article.

References

Laudan, Larry. “Science at the Bar—Causes for Concern.” In But Is It Sceince? Edited by Michael Ruse, pp. 351–55. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus, 1988.

Leo XIII, “Providentissimus Deus.” Vatican, Italy, 1893. Translated by the Libreria Editrice Vaticana.

NASA: Space Place. https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/sun-compare/en/.

New American Bible: Revised Edition (NAB). Totowa, NJ: Catholic Book Publishing Corp., 2011. Translated and annotated by the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine Inc.: Washington, DC, 2010. (ISBN: 9780899429519.)

Nicene Creed, 381 CE. https://www.catholic.org/prayers/prayer.php?p=495.

Schadewald, Robert J. “The Flat-Earth Bible.” Lock Haven University: https://lockhaven.edu/~dsimanek/febible.htm.

Taylor, Ian. In the Minds of Men: Darwin and the New World Order. Toronto, ON: TFE Publishing, 1991. (ISBN: 0969178840.)

The Holy Bible: King James Version (KJV). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1769.

Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania: Patterson, NY. New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (NWT). Wallkill, NY: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of New York Inc., 2013.

Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania. The Bible: God’s Word or Man’s? Brooklyn, NY: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., 1989. Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania. “Was Life Created?” Wallkill, NY: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of New York Inc., 2010.