WmTrevor,
You say you're unaware of any line of reasoning which supports young earth creationism except that which is claimed by people who already believe it. Do you know of any line of reasoning which supports evolution theory except that which is claimed by people who believe that?

You ask, "Is there anyone who makes a case that the earth is 6000 years old who does not accept a literalist account of Genesis or belief in the Bible? Their arguments would be extraordinary and really interesting." 

Similarly could I ask you, is there anyone who makes a case that the earth is 4 billion years old who does not accept evolutionary theory? I would esteem their arguments beyond extraordinary.

That's very thoughtful of you, Dan S de Merengue.

>>Pericles, I can understand you not quite following my explanations for a young earth from moon cratering<<

Being a bear of such little brain, I do find it enormously challenging to discard scientific theories and observations developed by highly intelligent and well-educated scientists, in favour of a narrative developed two and a half thousand years ago by a bunch of priests in exile from Judah.

Or perhaps you believe that Genesis was in fact an eye-witness account, written by Adam himself?

http://www.british-israel.ca/Genesis.htm#.UT1kbDCno_4

"Wiseman suggests that it was God himself, who wrote as he wrote the Ten Commandments, on clay tablets. According to the Text it was written after creation itself, then he must of [sic] taught Adam to write."

But I notice that you carefully sidestepped the issue of selective belief, did you not? Given that you are committed to the concept that Genesis is the last word on the creation of the universe, are you equally committed to the description of its demise in Revelations?

And give that you might be committed to both, where do you stand on Leviticus?

>>What I am saying is that if you're truly open to or interested (and I doubt you are) in creationists' theories, then I'm encouraging you to go and read their literature.<<

You do me a grave injustice if you believe that I have not given "Answers", and much literature along the same lines, my most earnest and open-minded scrutiny.

It may be the quality of the writing, in that it fails to convey a convincing enough story, or maybe it is just that the quality of the ideas themselves lacks rigour, but none has yet made any impact.

But please don't blame yourself.

>>I don't actually believe that any of us here will solve the world's mysteries in 350 words.<<

Your arguments are at least as cogent and well-presented as anything in "Answers".

Dan S de Merengue asks: “…is there anyone who makes a case that the earth is 4 billion years old who does not accept evolutionary theory?”

Yes, there is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Earth_creationism

So am I correct, Dan S de Merengue, in taking it that your answer to my question is "No"?

You keep reversing the horse and cart in the questions... the phrase 'already believe it' used by me was missing in your comparison question, "Do you know of any line of reasoning which supports evolution theory except that which is claimed by people who [already] believe that?"

The answer to which is multiples of "Yes."

Philosophically science is pessimistic and assumes what we think is wrong and keeps testing until it looks like it might be right whereas YEC says it knows what is right and ignores all the test results.

"Similarly could I ask you, is there anyone who makes a case that the earth is 4 billion years old who does not accept evolutionary theory? I would esteem their arguments beyond extraordinary."

Heaps of various strands of old earth creationists, though I don't know any individuals personally...

Plus, of course, Hindu's. Which I accept could be seen as a special case since they regard us as devolving.

Followers of Jainism complicate the question with their concept of the karma of embodied beings, so the jury's out on them.

Pericles,
I said I was willing to discuss the contents of The Creation Answers Book, which deals with commonly asked questions regarding theories of Biblical creation. You’re right that I deliberately avoided your question about Leviticus and Revelation. I don’t think they are mentioned in the ‘Answers’ book, and aren’t so relevant to theories of creation. It would be good to try and focus the discussion somehow, or otherwise it could potentially digress into any or every possible direction.

Bugsy,
It’s clear you don’t like me, but at least you still notice me.

WmTrevor,
When you’re inclined to answer your own questions, I suspect that they were mainly of rhetorical nature. And so I merely turned your questioned around in rhetoric form to try and make a point, that it is merely axiomatic to see that those supporting a particular view are the advocates of that view.

Your idea of the scientific method, that it, “assumes what we think is wrong and keeps testing until it looks like it might be right,” I think needs some more development. Described as such, I don’t think that makes a lot of sense.

But I am prepared to revisit your earlier comment, when you said you were “unaware of any line of reasoning which supports young earth creationism except that which is claimed by people who already believe it.”

Perhaps you should have asked Pericles. He claims to have given the Answers book and other creationist literature much scrutiny. He could have pointed out some of the many evidences for a young earth contained therein, gathered from a variety of sources. An example might be the dinosaur fossils discovered by Mary Schweitzer to have not completely mineralised, even showing bones with blood cells, hemoglobin and other soft tissue. The evidence (taken outside of the long age, millions of years, evolutionary paradigm) would naturally suggest a recent age for such creatures.

Well, you say that Dan S de Merengue.

>>Pericles, I said I was willing to discuss the contents of The Creation Answers Book<<

But you don't actually do that, do you?

I ask one question, which was how does the presence of million-year-old volcanic rock on the moon support the theory of a six thousand year-old earth. And get no response. Except to suggest that because it is only a million (or ten, or whatever) years, that must perforce disprove all theories to do with the age of volcanic rock.

Now we have the same problem with dinosaur blood. Based entirely on the fact that someone found blood where no-one had found blood before, you reason that the earth is six thousand years old. Even though the reason the whole thing was considered amazing, was that the fossil was in fact 68 million years old. Where's the logic in that?

"Creation magazine claimed that Schweitzer’s research was 'powerful testimony against the whole idea of dinosaurs living millions of years ago. It speaks volumes for the Bible’s account of a recent creation.'

This drives Schweitzer crazy. Geologists have established that the Hell Creek Formation, where B. rex was found, is 68 million years old, and so are the bones buried in it. She’s horrified that some Christians accuse her of hiding the true meaning of her data. 'They treat you really bad,' she says. 'They twist your words and they manipulate your data.'"

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/dinosaur.html

Incidentally, the reason for introducing Revelations and Leviticus was to try to understand why you put so much faith in the literal interpretation in Genesis. We don't need to discuss them at all, just tell us whether you have the same conviction that they represent reality.