Actualism: YEC Confusion

The Authors of Oard and Reed (2009) Still Confuse Actualism with Lyell Uniformitarianism

Kevin R. Henke, Ph.D.

May 4, 2014

In general, young-Earth creationists (YECs) have been extremely slow to recognize the transformation of Lyell uniformitarianism to actualism in the 20th century (also see "The 20th Century Transition from Lyell Uniformitarianism to Actualism"). Geologists Dott and Batten (1988, p. 44) came to the following conclusion about many of the YECs of the 1980s:

“These people [YECs] persist in representing modern geology as still assuming the extreme gradualism of Lyell, which is absurd. Geologists today routinely accept sudden, violent, and even historically unique events as perfectly consistent with modern earth theory.”

Strahler (1999, pp. 149, 190-195, 453-454) also extensively discusses YEC misconceptions of modern uniformitarianism (actualism) during the 1970s-1980s.

To their credit, Oard (2009a, p. 114) and Reed and Oard (2009b, p. 259) recognize the important role of natural catastrophes in actualism. However, just as we think that YECs have finally read some geology textbooks and recognized that gradualism is not the only option for actualism, the authors of Oard and Reed (2009) make a number of statements that demonstrate that they really don’t understand actualism or even know how to consistently apply their own definitions of actualism and uniformitarianism (also see “Inadequate and Contradictory Definitions and Descriptions of Actualism and Other Terms in Oard and Reed (2009)” and "Mr. Oard's Confused and Outdated Beliefs on Actualism"). For example, Klevberg and Bandy (2009, p. 63, 81) in Oard and Reed (2009) repeat the same old YEC mistakes from the 1970s-1980s. They only mention the role of gradualism in the “establishment geologic paradigm” (that is, actualism). Klevberg and Bandy (2009, p. 63, 81) also ignore the important role of natural catastrophes in actualism, including in the formation of soils, and leave catastrophes solely to the YEC paradigm. As another example of their misunderstandings, Klevberg and Bandy (2009, Table 7 on p. 81) make the giant mistake of suggesting that geologists believe that erosion rates were relatively constant over geologic time. Their mistaken beliefs that actualism (modern uniformitarianism) only involves gradual changes or relatively constant conditions over time cause Klevberg and Bandy (2009) to present unrealistic views of the effects of groundwater (for example, p. 82 and their Table 9, p. 83) and other environmental factors on soil development under actualism. Klevberg and Bandy (2009, p. 70) continue to punch the Lyell uniformitarian strawperson by claiming that modern uniformitarianism “assumes” that soil-forming mechanisms are “linear” and “similar to modern rates.” You would think that Mr. Oard and Dr. Reed, as editors of Oard and Reed (2009), would have caught these numerous misconceptions, errors and inconsistencies between the authors of various chapters of their book and corrected them. But, they didn't. They didn't even spell Dr. Hutchison's name correctly and he is the YEC author of chapter three of Oard and Reed (2009). When Oard (2009a, p. 113) proclaims that YECs have a good understanding of “uniformitarian” (actualistic) arguments, the error-filled contents of Oard and Reed (2009) repeatedly show otherwise.

In contrast to the common misconceptions of actualism among YECs, the historical summaries in YEC Austin (1979) are essentially correct and his discussions are far superior to Reed and Oard (2009a), Oard (2009a), and even Austin (1984). Interestingly, Austin (1979, p. 40) makes the following valid statement, which is very strange for an individual that should only trust the Bible to provide reliable evidence of unwitnessed past events in the geologic record:

“It should be emphasized, however, that no theory of rates, be it gradual or catastrophic, should be accepted without geological evidence.”

References

Austin, S.A. 1979. “Uniformitarianism- A Doctrine that Needs Rethinking”, The Compass, v. 56, n. 2, pp. 29-45.

Austin, S.A. 1984. Catastrophes in Earth History: A Source Book of Geological Evidence, Speculation, and Theory, Institute for Creation Research, Monograph No. 13, El Cajon, CA, USA.

Dott, R.H. and R. L. Batten. 1988. Evolution of the Earth, 4th edition, McGraw-Hill Book Co., New York, 684pp.

Klevberg, P. and R. Bandy. 2009. “Do Soils Indicate Long Ages?”, chapter 5 in M.J. Oard and J.K. Reed (editors). 2009. Rock Solid Answers: The Biblical Truth Behind 14 Geological Questions, Master Books: Green Forest, AR, pp. 63-92.

Oard, M.J. 2009a. “Landslides Win in a Landslide over Ancient 'Ice Ages'“, chapter 7 in M.J. Oard and J.K. Reed (editors). 2009. Rock Solid Answers: The Biblical Truth Behind 14 Geological Questions, Master Books: Green Forest, AR, pp. 111-123.

Oard, M.J. and J.K. Reed (editors). 2009. Rock Solid Answers: The Biblical Truth Behind 14 Geological Questions, Master Books: Green Forest, AR, 272 pp.

Reed, J.K. and M.J. Oard. 2009a. “A Context for the Flood Geology Debate,” chapter 1 in M.J. Oard and J.K. Reed (editors). 2009. Rock Solid Answers: The Biblical Truth Behind 14 Geological Questions, Master Books: Green Forest, AR, pp. 11-17.

Reed, J.K. and M.J. Oard. 2009b. “Conclusion”, chapter 16 in M.J. Oard and J.K. Reed (editors). 2009. Rock Solid Answers: The Biblical Truth Behind 14 Geological Questions, Master Books: Green Forest, AR, pp. 259-261.

Strahler, A.N. 1999. Science and Earth History-The Evolution/Creation Controversy, Prometheus Books, Amherst, New York, USA, 552pp.