Arcanine said:
Herein lies the issue with the Big Bang theory.
Current theory states that, if indeed the Big Bang actually occurred, the universe is expanding at light speed (or, at least, extremely close to said velocity) in all directions. In order to detect the 'leading edge' of that explosion, you'd need to travel at faster-than-light speeds, or have equipment that can operate at faster-than-light speeds. As far as I'm aware, there are efforts underway to bend the laws of physics and make FTL travel possible (look up 'Alcubierre Drive), but even so, the sheer amount of time it would take for any instrumentation to catch up to, arrive at, and then surpass that leading edge (not to mention relaying said data back), would make the venture impossible.
As I said before, scientific theory merely supports a theory given available data at the time. When a more viable theory comes along that can be tried and tested, it's passed and accepted as the new standard.
Oh, and as far as your 'dinosaur and man' theory comes along - I have a degree in archaeology, and believe me, there's very little chance. Even given the fact that the fossil records don't match up, the strata data would never match up, nor would carbon dating hold up any evidence to support the theory. The earliest proto-human fossils known date back only several million years, while dinosaurs roamed the Earth up to 65 million years ago - there's a very substantial fossil record gap between the disappearance of one set of species, and the emergence of another.
So it can't be proven true, or untrue, if I get the basic principle of what you're saying there. That presents a real problem then when these theories are presented, taught, and indoctrinated into the minds of the next generation as unquestionable fact and those who question or deny it are subsequently shunned as "ignorant." That, to me, is not science. Science should be based upon that which we can
prove not what we simply envision as a possibility.
Something I am curious about with the whole "man and dinosaur never shared the world" theory, how then would the men who wrote the Bible several thousand years ago be able to describe, in detail, creatures they refer to as "leviathans," "dragons," "behemoths," or simply "great beasts?" Those actually study these accounts found them to be describing what could only be dinosaurs. Before archaeology, before skeletal reconstruction, before simulated motion and "prehistoric study," these people described what modern scientists only felt comfortable stating after years of studying bone structure and assumed musculature.
But now we're into another problem of "theoretical" science vs. reality when it comes to things like radioactive dating. There's an analogy that goes like this: you walk into a room that has a lit candle in it, and and an opening beneath it so the melted wax can drain away. You have a ruler, a calculator, a pen and paper, and a stopwatch. You can measure the rate at which the candle is burning, you can measure how much of the candle is left, and thus you can calculate how long (barring any variables) how long it will take for the candle to burn itself down to nothing. But here's where reality steps in: you have no idea what happened in that room before you entered. You have no idea if the candle's rate of burn was slowed or accelerated at any point. But most importantly, you cannot determine how tall the candle was to begin with. Radioactive dating can measure how much a specimen has left, and can measure how long it takes for what's let to dissipate completely, but because it was never "new" to us, we can't tell how much it had to begin with. Whether the Earth is 6,000 years old, or 72 billion years old, the simple fact is there is not a single person alive in all the world who was there at the beginning and could tell you how much of any chemical was in anything when it was first formed. Beyond that, as I'm sure you would agree, there are no dinosaurs around today, nor even any specimens of the fauna or flora of that time, thus we can't, in all honesty, say that we know how much carbon, or nitrogen, or any other element ANY of them contained when first they were formed. Speaking strictly in terms of science and scientific fact, radioactive dating data does not qualify.
So then you fall back on the strata, where these fossils were found in the rock layers. Now assume for a moment that the Biblical flood did, indeed, happen (countless cultures other than the Jews and Hebrews refer to a great and cataclysmic flood, so it seems safe to assume that it did indeed happen). As the Bible and other texts describe it, it was not merely rain falling from the sky ,but the Earth itself being torn open and pouring forth water from the depths. Put that all together and there's one simple conclusion to draw: total and absolute upheaval across the globe. All the scientific theories to date can't explain why there are marine life fossils being found in land-locked plateaus and even up in the mountains, certainly they couldn't have crawled up there. But if the entire world was flooded as the Bible states then those mountains and plateaus were under water for a significant amount of time, and when the flood waters rapidly receded, well it most certainly is entirely likely that not only would marine life be stranded, but the bodies of the creatures that were caught and drowned by the flood would likewise be scattered.
Among other resources, I would suggest taking a look into the "Answers in Genesis" website, as you just might find answers and in better detail and with better references than I have been able to provide on my own.
