It seems like one of those open-ended debates where we can't ever progress beyond what we believe to be true about the age of the Earth. "Belief," no matter how strong one's conviction, is not the same as "fact." And I say that in the context that asserting that the Earth is billions of years old seems no more or less "provable" than saying the Earth is 6000 years old. What if "God" created Earth using really old raw materials?

Who knows? If we believe in "creation," we can only state that the Earth was created, not how. Meanwhile, scientists theorize that the Big Bang created the Universe 13.8 billion years ago. In spite of whatever collective wisdom we may have, we might assert "that" it happened, but how is little more than theoretical speculation.

How do we know that "God" isn't merely a species of super-advanced aliens whose civilization and technology is advanced to the point where our interpretation of "life" is little more than slime mold? And Earth, and humans, are just one of their science experiments? "Hey Bob, let's see if we can grow life near this G2 class star! Do we have any more rocks in the back?"

I tend to not engage in these discussions much because they tend to be extraordinarily "human centric," meaning that we don't consider possible answers in which we humans are not "center stage," but just tiny "bit players" in a much bigger production.

Bright Blessings!