One of the most stubborn problems for Young Earth Creationists (YEC’s) is that of distant starlight.

The light from our nearest neighbouring galaxy – the Andromeda Galaxy – has been traveling about 2.5 million years before it reaches the eye of an observer here on Earth.  And yet, according to YEC’s the entire cosmos is only a few thousand years old!

Various theories have been advanced in order to deal with this:

1. It has been suggested that light, when traveling vast distances, is able to take a ‘short cut’.  But no evidence or mathematical support has been offered for this theory, whereas numerous problems have been identified.  It can be regarded as no more than a curiosity.

2. It has been argued that the speed of light has slowed down, and that six thousand years ago it travelled a million times fast than it does today.  But the evidence appealed to – 17th century data – reveals variations in measurement that are due to the technical limitations of the day.  Furthermore, such a change in the speed of light would have a catastrophic effect on the physical constants of the universe.

3.  Dale Humphreys (Starlight and Time, 1994) appeals to Einstein’s theory of relativity to argue for a dilation of time approach, such that although only days had occurred on Earth, billions of years would have passed in the rest of the universe.  Thus, an ‘old’ universe coexists with a ‘young’ earth.

Humphrey’s appeal to Scriptures that speak of God ‘stretching out’ the heavens (Job 9:8; Psa 104:2; Isa 40:22; Zech 12:1) should already sound alarm bells for careful exegetes.

One of the problems with this theory is that it seems to require that light from distant galaxies is blue-shifted, whereas in fact it is red-shifted.  Moreover, the model predicts that the rest of the Solar System should bear the marks of youthfulness, whereas it shows every sign of being billions of years old.

4. Jason Lisle, an astronomer with Answers in Genesis and the Institute for Creation Research, thinks, on the basis of Einstein’s theory of relativity, that light is capable of traveling at varying speeds (some near-infinite).  Earth (it is proposed) occupies a privileged place in the cosmos, so that light from the furthest reaches of the universe arrives almost instantaneously.

Once more, this appears to have the character of an ad hoc theory, with little or no theoretical or practical support.

(See also this set of ‘possible explanations’)

5. Given the weakness of the theories so far mentioned, most YEC’s support a ‘mature creation’ theory.  By means of this theory, proponents hope to reconcile biblical data (which, according to them, teaches that the earth is just a few thousand years old) and scientific data (which indicates that it is several billion years old).

The theory originated with the work of Philip Henry Gosse, in his 1857 work Omphalos: An Attempt to Untie the Geological Knot.

The argument is that everything that God created would have come into being with an apparent age.  Adam, we presume, was created as a man, and so would have appeared to have been at least 18 years old when, actually, he had existed only a few hours.  He would (it is assumed) have had a belly button, and therefore signs of having been in a woman’s womb.  Tree would have had growth rings, and so on.

Henry Morris argued that when God created a star, he made it not only with an apparent age, but with its light already in transit.

Proponents find an analogy in Jesus’ miracle of turning water into wine.  The master of the feast thought that the wine was older than it actually was (Jn 2:10).  Wine, after all, requires a vineyard, harvesting, fermentation, and so on, and all of these take time.

Russell Humphreys (himself a YEC) raises five objections to this theory:

• It has no clear biblical support.
• It requires one to believe that most of the events we witness in the heavens never actually happened.
• It has little explanatory power.  Why would God create a vast universe just a few thousand years ago and give it an appearance of such great antiquity?
• It is untestable.  It can be neither proven nor disproven.  In the words of Bertand Russell: ‘We may all have come into existence five minutes ago, provided with ready-made memories, with holes in our socks and hair that needed cutting.’  It is, accordingly, a fideistic position, placing creation beyond investigation.
• It impedes further investigation.  The theory seems to amount to a denial of (much of) physical reality.  Why bother to study things that never really existed and phenomena that never really occurred?

Among additional objections raised by old-earth advocate Davis Young, the following seems especially pertinent:

‘Proponents of this literalism must then be willing to accept the consequence that fossil elephant bones, fossil dinosaurs, and fossil trees are illusions created in place, and that such “fossils” tell us absolutely nothing whatsoever about formerly existing elephants, dinosaurs, or trees.’

The ‘mature creation’ theory is an admission that the evidence is against the young earth view.

Based on: 40 Questions about Creation and Evolution, by Kenneth D. Keathley and Mark F. Rooker. 2014.  Chapters 21-22.

See also this defence of a ‘mature creation’ approach.