We’ve spent a considerable amount of time on cosmology (over 66 pages). And like other topics in the past (geology, archaeology, etc), we could go forever, but I’m going to wrap up this topic.
Going by the evidence that we’re near the center of the universe and without the need to introduce multiple ad hoc explanations (inflation, stretching of spacetime, dark energy), the white hole model of the early universe explains the phenomenon of extreme redshifting of distant objects.
Though some things can be explained in a scientific manner, there are things that are beyond science. Science cannot explain the singularity (where math breaks down), the origin of the singularity (a violation of conservation of mass/energy), the decrease in entropy (a violation of laws of thermodynamics), why there would be an explosion and the mechanism for it, etc.
We see in Genesis 1 a story that presents it in a way that anyone can understand the creation of the world. Is it all scientifically true? No, but it doesn’t need to be entirely scientifically true because not even science can scientifically explain the origin of the universe. And as I’ve argued, it has already breached into the realm of the extranatural to explain things.
However I do believe there is an underlying basis for the Genesis account that is supported by science. And my current view of the origin of the universe is a literal 6 day reading of Genesis coupled with the white hole model.
The white hole model gives a central position to earth in the universe, which Genesis presents in a literary way. Even in a metaphorical sense, we are a privileged planet since there is no indication that life exists elsewhere and there are many barriers for life to exist on other planets.
Because of gravitational time dilation and time is relative, it is reasonable that earth time would be different than time experienced outside of earth. This accounts for why it would take starlight billions of years to reach earth, but yet earth would have existed for far less than that.
So, I believe it is entirely reasonable to accept a literalistic reading of the origin account in Genesis which has grounding in science.
As astronomer Robert Jastrow has said:
“Astronomers now find they have painted themselves into a corner because they have proven, by their own methods, that the world began abruptly in an act of creation to which you can trace the seeds of every star, every planet, every living thing in this cosmos and on the earth. And they have found that all this happened as a product of forces they cannot hope to discover. That there are what I or anyone would call supernatural forces at work is now, I think, a scientifically proven fact.”
Next, we’re going to go into the most important topic to debate on. So far, everything we’ve debated are actually not critically important to Christianity. Someone can not take the flood, Exodus account, Genesis creation account as all literal events and still be considered a conservative Christian. They can still be saved even if they take all these as entirely allegorical stories. But the next topic must be accepted to be a Christian.
https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1104043#p1104043