A talk about the different perspective of science and Christianity with specific example of the creation of the universe

1. Science and Christianity
Dr Alex Tang

2. Understanding Reality
A. Religious Reality
B. Scientific Reality

3. A.Religious Reality

4. Christianity argues from a
God who reveals
• Specific revelation – the Bible which was
written by bronze age, pre-scientific,
authors in a tribal-based society who were
inspired by God to write accurate text
• General revelation – which is God’s
creation and also the inherent ethics in
human nature

5. Specific Revelation - Bible
the bible is written in many genre. The bible must be read according to
the genre
• Epic: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
• Historical narrative: Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings,
1 and 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Jonah, and possibly Acts
• Law: the last half of Exodus; also Leviticus, Deuteronomy
• Wisdom: Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes
• Poetic: Psalms, Song of Solomon, Lamentations
• Prophecy: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah,
Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi
• Apocalyptic: Daniel, Revelation
• Gospel: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and possibly Acts
• Epistle (letter): Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians,
Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus,
Philemon, Hebrews, James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2, and 3 John, Jude
The text must be understood by the context of the genre

6. B. Scientific
Reality

7. The scientific method
• Collecting data about a phenomenon
(measurable)
• Postulating a possible tentative opinion about how
a part of it works
• Testing the opinion to see if it is accurate
• Rejecting it if it is not accurate
• Recycling the entire process if the opinion seems
to be accurate.
• Publishing the results in peer-reviewed journals so
that other scientists can attempt to replicate the
findings

8. Scientific data
• Speculation
• Extrapolation
• ‘Reproducible’
• Part of a general theory

9. Creation

10. Genesis record
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the
earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness
was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was
hovering over the waters.
• Day One: light, night and day (Gen 1: 3-5)
• Day Two: separation of water, sky above (Gen 1: 6-8)
• Day Three: land and seas, plants on land (Gen 1: 9-13)
• Day Four: sun, moon, stars (Gen 1: 14-19)
• Day Five: fish and birds (Gen 1: 20-23)
• Day Six: animals and man (Gen 1: 24-31)
• Day Seven: God rested (Gen 2:1-2)

11. Creationism
All creation in 6 days (24 hours period)

12. Origin of the Universe-scientific data
• the universe began in a Big Bang
expansion 15 billion years ago
• Three hundred thousand years after the
Big Bang, matter and radiation separate
and cosmic background radiation first
appears
• Five billion years after the Big Bang, the
Milky Way galaxy evolves
• Ten billion years after the Big Bang, the
Solar System forms

13. Habitable earth
• Earth was formed about 4.59 billion
years ago
• 4.25 billion years ago, a body about
the size of Mars collided with the
earth
• Fossil records

14. The Theory of Evolution
• Darwinism support the thesis ‘the
survival of the fittest’
• Neo-Darwinism describes evolution
of life from the formation of amino
acids in the primeval sea of early
earth to the great varieties of flora
and fauna that exist on earth today

15. Problems with the Theory of Evolution
• intermediate species should be present in the
fossil records as one species evolves into another
• no intermediate species or ‘missing-links’ in all the
fossil records has been found
• unable duplicate the origin of life
• no new species has been discovered
• the mechanism of evolution. It is often assume
that mutation at the genetic level is what causes
the changes in a species - mutations are often
detrimental to the organisms and they do not
survived

16. How did the eye evolve?

17. What about man?
Paleoanthropologists
are frustrated by the
existence of two
extensive gaps in
the fossil records.

18. What about man?
• The first gap, know as the hominoid gap
extends from 32 to 22 million years ago.
This gap is when evolutionist suspected
the ancestors of apes and ‘humans’ are
splitting off from monkeys.
• The second gap, known as the hominid
gap extends from 14 to 4.5 million years
ago. It is the time where ancestors of the
australopithecine and ‘human’ groups are
alleged to split from the ancestors of the
African apes, especially the chimpanzees

19. Creationism versus Evolution

20. Progressive Creationism
• the word yôm, day does not only mean a 24
hours period. It can also be used to mean
an indefinite or a long period of time
• if each day is a long period of time,
geological layering, the fossil record and
the evidence for an old earth can fit easily
into this approach

21. Progressive Creationism
• The seventh day did not conclude with the
formula ‘there was evening and there was
morning’ indicating that it is still continuing. If the
seventh days can extend over thousands/millions
of years, there is no reason why the previous six
days could not cover millions of years.
• Progressive Creationism believe that God is
actively involved in the creation process, allowing
slow progress with mass extinction and rapid
advances

22. http://www.kairos2.com/CriticalEvaluationGenesisOne.htm

23. Is there a conflict between
Science and Christianity?

24. Science is trying
to explain what
God has already
created

25. We only just began to
understand God’s creation
• Human consciousness
• Human soul
• Higgs boson particles make up an invisible force
throughout the universe called a Higgs field. Without
it, the universe as we know it could not exist
• dark matter — which makes up 22 percent of the
universe — and dark energy
• string theory, which includes the possibility that of an
11-dimensional multiverses

27. Transcript of the talk is available at
www.kairos2.com/science.n.Christianity