Starting points and viewpoints

Creationists challenge those who do not hold their opinions to be open minded and they criticize scientists for being closed minded for failing to consider the creationist position. Creationists also state that they are scientists doing scientific things, it is just that they have a different starting point than evolutionists. All of these assertions make an appeal a reasonable fair person, why then is the creationist position so rejected by the scientific community?

One of the main points where the scientific and creationist viewpoints diverge is that "starting point," the age of the Earth. On the authority of Genesis, creationists assert that Bishop Ussher's 6,000 year (+/-) estimate of the age of the Earth is true. The bulk of the arguments presented in support of their hypothesis consist of attempting to demonstrate that various processes occur very quickly (rapid burial of coal, fossilization of creatures giving birth, etc) or that the Earth would be a very different place "if it were as old as evolutionists say" (all continents eroded to sea level, seas filled with sediment, seas saltier, ¹⁴C at equilibrium, etc.).

Scientists started with the same viewpoint as did creationists. There was a time when the age of the Earth, on Biblical authority, seemed to be young, and Bishop Ussher, using genealogy and other text clues set the date of creation to about 4004 BCE. However, as people began looking at the world around them, this date was not consistent with physical evidence. The layered rocks weren't formed as the result of a single event; they weren't even formed by one single process. Rather, the layered rocks were formed by many different processes. From this point, scientific and creationist views diverged; scientists realized that on human terms, Earth is unimaginably old. From this viewpoint, scientists say, yes, some coal was buried quickly, but there are many different coal layers. Formation of coal and burial occurred not once, but thousands of times. Rapid burial is a condition necessary for preserving fossils; without rapid burial, scavengers and decomposers scatter and break down the body and bones so that no remains are left.

Are scientists open-minded? There are scientists who have developed a cherished idea and have force fit all observations and evidence into that framework. That is the weakness of an individual. Science, however, has a requirement that an idea be reproducible and verifiable by others. A scientist starts with evidence and comes to conclusions. OK, I will concede at this point that scientists operate within a framework of the evidence and ideas of their predecessors. Scientists, don't automatically assume their predecessors are correct. What real scientists do not do, is pledge that no matter what they do, it will always and invariantly be in compliance with a preconceived notion revealed in a sacred text.

Creationists do not appear particularly scientific or open minded. If one chooses data on the basis of whether it demonstrates a preconceived idea and rejects contrary information, if one repeats the same arguments and holds to the same idea in the light of new information, these are the hallmarks of someone who is not doing science.